The Ledbury Naturalists' Field Club recently delegated Ledbury teenager, Lucy Loten, to attend a conference on their behalf at Hartpury University, when hedgehogs were the topic.

Miss Loten, aged 18, of the New Mills estate, hopes to work with fellow Ledbury Naturalists Field Club members on a local hedgehog monitoring project this spring.

The conference at Hartpury was attended by vets, academics, students and animal welfare workers.

Numbers of hedgehogs are falling in the UK, perhaps down by 50 per cent since the turn of this century.