What problem does a hedgehog-corridor audit solve?

A small urban reserve can look healthy by day and still fail nocturnal mammals because fences, lighting and hard edges split movement into isolated patches. A corridor audit replaces anecdotal sightings with repeatable evidence: where animals move, where they are blocked, and which repairs are worth funding first.

On a six-hectare site, for instance, three road-kill records and two fence gaps may be known, yet no confirmed route links the meadow to the allotments. The takeaway is blunt: manage the corridor, not just the habitat patch.

Why does structured digital capture beat paper notes?

Paper sheets lose spatial precision: a note reading gap behind the pavilion is difficult to compare with next season’s note. The cause is that field observations are time-stamped, geotagged and photographed, while paper records only part of that context.

Using wildzy as the capture layer, a surveyor can log a footprint, a blocked culvert or a new fence panel with coordinates, photo and habitat note in one pass. The solution is a repeatable record that a volunteer can produce without specialist GIS training.

How should a small team run the first survey?

Fix the route before dusk. Walk the boundary, the two main hedgerows and any lit footpaths, recording evidence and barriers separately; a footprint is evidence, a fresh fence panel is a barrier.

Repeat that route three times in a fortnight under similar weather. The development that matters is the pattern rather than a single sighting: if gaps cluster on the north edge, the result points to a specific repair instead of a site-wide habitat project.

Keep the field protocol short enough to survive volunteer turnover: one route, one list of barrier types, one photo standard. Complexity is the usual cause of abandoned surveys.

What does a useful output look like?

The output should serve a committee meeting and a volunteer brief at the same time. Produce one map layer for confirmed movement, one for barriers, and a ranked intervention list with owners and rough costs.

• Clear a 15 cm gap under a gate before installing a new tile.
• Add hedgehog highway tiles where new fencing cuts an existing line.
• Shield or redirect a security light that spills onto a known crossing point.

The result is a defensible maintenance plan rather than a one-off report. Wildzy’s value is the field discipline it enforces: same route, same fields, same comparison next season.