New owner questions

[Kalandra]

This section of the forums is here for a couple of purposes.

First, in time we will be adding threads which are answers to frequently answered questions. This hopefully will give new owners a vaulable reference source without having to search the entire forums for these answers.

Second, new owners are also encouraged to ask questions here which they feel may be a basic question due their new pet. I may change this.

I am opening this section now to get it up and running, there isn't much here at the moment, but in time I hope to have it packed with information. Be warned that I'm still working out what all I want out of this section, so some things may change. I am also open to suggestions of additions.

[anneRN]

would this be a place for archiving housing thread, how to make a wheel thread, maybe a food thread?

[HedgeMom]

How about a pinned thread with all the really good links to members care pages so if someone doesn't get back to them right away they could read what's on someone's webpage?

Nancy

[Kalandra]

In the chin section one of the buddies is working on FAQs. Threads which will be pinned that contain general information every new owner needs to know. I hope to do the same here too. Such FAQs will be pinned at the top of this section.... and I'm considering pinning threads to all the sections which contain the questions which are constantly being asked and their answers. That way if someone has the question "What food should I feed my hedgehog" They can just look at the FAQ of that section and either follow a links to these already answered questions, or perhaps just reanswer them in that one thread....

Make sense? Basically my intention is to try to not only have these forums be a place where you can ask questions, but also for them to contain basic FAQs which are really already answered on here.

All in all there is going to be a lot of work that is going to be needed... a lot of time... and I'm asking for the membership to help... as I stated before these forums are what its members make them.

[Megan.]

Kal,
I can work on a Hedgehog FAQ , with the basic questions pertaining to food, caging, play time, ect just a basic thing...Only thing i'll need is someone to proof read it as I am not the best at spelling/explaining things lol

[Kalandra]

Sounds good to me Megan. These are things I expect will need changed occasionaly since things to do and don't do seem to constantly be changing as we learn more about hedgehogs.

[starkissed]

The most useful stuff for me was about temperature/hibernation/heat source, diet (what is appropriate, and more importantly what is not appropriate), and how to make a hedgehog like its people (or at least tolerate them). I've also spent a lot of time searching for these things. Just thought it might prove helpful. Another thing that would be a nice addition to the forums is a small page of links to sites that sell supplies and offer information that most people can agree with. I have spent a lot of time looking for links (I like my information to come from as many sources as possible). Same stuff goes for the new chinchilla owner forum (be sure to add ways to cool off a chin, and how to chin proof your house...sorry, don't want to have to post the same thing twice).

Just thought I'd add my input, having been one of those newbies (still being one of those newbies?).

[Kalandra]

We have planned to do something similar to that and in time hopefully it will work out....

Have you taken a look at my web site under products? I try hard to keep it updated on where to find food... then there is the housing page which gives recommendations on items you can use (some list where to buy them)....

[starkissed]

Yes, your site was one of the ones I looked at before Aaron and I got Wallace. I liked it (especially since it's Michigan oriented). I didn't find it until after I was on this forum a while though. Hedgehog hollow was the first reallly informative site I stumbled across. It just was very hard for me to find information I considered informed and somewhat complete. Same thing for chinchillas. I think I'd been searching for about a month about chinchilla behavior and health before I came across this site. My worry is that with the information overload that is the internet, people have a hard time finding good, useful information. Or maybe I'm just not good at web seraches.
Give me a couple more days of unemployment and I can come up with some good questions for this discussion. I've had so many questions about Wallace that have been answered here. Searching for it just sucks though (so much information and I'm so impatient). And most of it is basic - can we say hibernation problems; there was so much information on hibernating hoggies that I gave up and just posted about it...didn't know where to start. This place is great though and I hope this section works out...it'll be a time saver.

[Kalandra]

I've moved the old hedgehog archives to reside under this forum and changed its name to hedgie faqs. If anyone would like to help work on topics which are asked frequently and links to the answers of those topics, please contact me with what subject you are working on (I don't want multiple people working on the same topic :) ).

I like the suggested topics above, if anyone wants to start on them.