Sharon and Andy Longhurst’s kitchen opens onto what they call “the ICU”: a garage filled with heated incubators, microscopes and 12 hedgehogs fighting for their lives.

“Never in a million years did we expect to do this,” said Andy Longhurst.

For the past three years, the couple have transformed their home in Fife, Scotland, into a hedgehog hospital, taking in more than 622 hedgehogs, most of which have been in critical condition. The couple both have jobs – she as a school crossing guard and he as a bus driver – but once they began helping the little nocturnal creatures, they felt a sense of responsibility to them.

“We give 100 percent to every single one, even if we feel it’s not going to make it,” Sharon Longhurst said.

West European hedgehogs, native to Britain, make their homes in

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