Monmouth teenager and hedgehog champion Dylan Allman has been working tirelessly for the last two years raising awareness of the plight of one of the UK’s most loved small mammals – the hedgehog.

His campaign has led to an appearance on BBC1s The One Show where he talked about his work and his campaign.

His talks to local community groups and making award-winning films, running live-stream events, and supporting his local rescue centre and the national Hedgehog Street campaign, led to the 15-year-old appearing on national TV.

At the start of Hedgehog Awareness Week 2022, Dylan announced that his efforts to engage garden equipment manufacturers is paying off, as Hyundai Power Products have agreed that every lawnmower and strimmer coming off the production line will now include a ‘Be Hedgehog Aware’ sticker on it. As Dylan explains, just putting a sticker on a box isn’t enough:

“People don’t keep boxes that equipment comes in, and they need to be reminded to look for hedgehogs every time they’re about to strim or mow,” the teenager said.

“A sticker on the actual piece of equipment reminds the gardener to check for hedgehogs first, which means they are much less likely to be injured if they’re discovered before strimming or mowing begins.”

Numbers of the Erinaceous Europaeus hedgehog have been in dramatic decline over the last 30 years resulting in them being red-listed as ‘Vulnerable to Extinction’ in 2020. Earlier this year the State of Britain’s Hedgehogs 2022 report revealed that although rural hedgehog numbers have declined between 30-75 per cent across different parts of the country since 2000, urban gardens are proving to be a lifeline for hedgehogs – but only if they are hedgehog-friendly and are connected to other gardens.

Many hedgehogs suffer horrific injuries each year from gardening equipment because people forget to check before they start to strim and mow, so when Dylan contacted Roland Llewellin, MD of Genpower Ltd, a UK distributor of Hyundai Power Products to tell them about his campaign and ambitious plans for the stickers, Roland couldn’t help but be impressed, as he explains:

“We are delighted for Hyundai Power Products to be working with Dylan and his ‘Hedgehog Aware’ campaign. It’s a very worthwhile cause and also very inspiring to see someone of Dylan’s age driving this forward. The first batch of machines with the stickers on have just come off the production line, and we can’t wait to get those out to the UK’s gardeners and start making a difference to helping reduce the number of hedgehogs injured.”

As part of Hedgehog Awareness Week 2022, Dylan live-streamed an event that took place on Saturday 7th May where he was joined by Roland from Genpower Ltd, as well as the local rescue centre he takes poorly hedgehogs to, and fundraises for.

Grace Johnson, Hedgehog Officer for Hedgehog Street (a joint campaign People’s Trust for Endangered Species and The British Hedgehog Preservation Society) added:

“Dylan is a fantastic Hedgehog Champion who is really making a difference for hedgehogs. We are thrilled that Hyundai Power Products are supporting Dylan, and we hope many other organisations follow suit.”

For free advice on how to help hedgehogs, visit www.hedgehogstreet.org