Hedgehog Name Generator

Hedgehog names cluster around four ideas: the quills, the shape, the coat and a certain cosy Englishness. The quills give you the obvious puns (Quill, Prickles, Spike, Needles, Thistle, Bramble, Pincushion) plus mock titles like Sir Prickles and Lord Quillington that suit an animal with a permanently offended expression. The shape, a ball when frightened and a loaf when relaxed, gives you Pebble, Conker, Acorn, Nugget, Dumpling, Biscuit and Rolo. The coat gives you a palette: most pet hedgehogs are African pygmies in salt-and-pepper or cinnamon, with albino, pinto and chocolate variants, so Pepper, Smudge, Cinnamon, Nutmeg, Patches, Snowball and Casper all describe a real animal.

The cosy strand comes from Beatrix Potter's Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle and a century of British garden folklore, which is why hedgehogs end up with names like Tiggy, Mabel, Herbert, Winifred and Hattie, plus hedgerow plants such as Hazel, Clover, Rowan and Gorse. Sonic supplies the fast names (Sonic, Shadow, Silver, Dash, Turbo), and the hedgehog's nocturnal habits supply Luna, Midnight, Nocturne and Eclipse. Because hedgehogs huff, hiss, pop and self-anoint with foam when they meet a new smell, grumpy and sneezy names such as Grumpy, Huffington, Snuffles and Sneezy are usually earned within a week.