Policies

Physical Goods/ Supplies:

Payment for a full cage setup is required when reserving your hedgehog, ensuring availability at least 14 days before the expected readiness date. Cage setups are only available for local pickup or direct transport within 150 miles and do not include a heat setup. Heating options can be discussed, and links to purchase heat setups from external sources are accessible from the product page.

Food and supply orders must be fully paid to reserve items such as snuggle sacks, tunnels, liners, scarves, and other handmade small animal supplies available on our eBay and Etsy stores. Custom orders cannot be initiated or reserved without payment. Free shipping is offered for US orders over $35.

Preview Contracts:

Hedgehog Adoption Contract Applies to hedgehogs adopted as pets

Transport Adoption Contract Applies to any pets leaving on public transport

Older Hedgehog / Owner Surrender Adoption Contract Applies to any hedgehog over 1 year old or with unknown lineage

Fancy Rat Adoption Contract Applies to Pet Fancy Rats

Breeder Purchase Contract Applies to Hedgehogs Purchased with Breeding Rights

Pickup:

Baby hedgehogs are ready for adoption between 6-8 weeks old and come with a starter food bag. Hedgehogs can leave between 6 and 7 weeks old, in some cases, 6-week-olds can leave if the meet 175g for 3 consecutive days with no weight loss as they grow. Our hedgehogs must be 8 weeks and 175g to leave for transport. We meet in a public location and will not meet up or zoom call individuals without applications. We don't allow in person visits for safety, liability, and the health guarantee reasons.

Baby rats are ready to leave our care at 8 weeks old in most cases as long as they are not showing any signs of illness, injury, or behavior issues.

Upon placing a deposit and completing a application and prescreening, we'll arrange a pick-up day and time. Available dates are approximate and not guaranteed for any pets.

Remember to bring your own carrier for car travel or purchase one from us at $10 for hedgehogs and $20 for Rat carriers. Notify us within 24 hours if you need a carrier.

Babies should be picked up within 7 days of the readiness date or inform us if there will be a delay.

There's a 7-day grace period for picking up your reserved pet. Optional boarding is available at $5 per day per pet. Balances must be settled by the 7th day after the readiness date, including boarding costs. Failure to pay may result in forfeiting your deposit and removing the hold on your reservation.

Anticipated Ready Dates:

Available pets must show consistent weight gain while weaning and no signs of illness. If anything changes you will be notified and either offered the option to select a different baby who's ready or given an updated ready date if you wish to wait until we are more confident about your baby's growth and health. Our estimated ready dates are calculated at the 7-week-old mark for hedgehogs and 8 weeks old for Fancy Rats.

Pet Pricing Guidelines:

Our hedgehogs start at $250, and the price can be raised for rare markings or colors. Generally, males, high pintos, and hedgehogs over 1 year old will always be priced lower.

Adults over a year old $200 - $300

Albino (Solid White with Red Eyes) $375- $400

Pinto (Spotted Quills) $300 - $475

Standard or Brown Classic Mask / Badger Striped (Classic mask or has 2 striped forehead) $325 - $400

High Snowflake / Platinum (skin has a base color but Quills are predominately White) $375 - $550

Quad Badger (Face has 4 stripes resembling white “eyebrows”) $375 - $475

Full Mask (Face has color up to forehead extending into the quills) $375- $475

Occasionally, we may have reduced fees for pets.

Rat Adoptions are $30 each no single rats can be adopted under any circumstance. We encourage multiples and trios are the best!​​

Waiting List:

Every month we open spots on our waiting list. An application on file and a deposit holding your spot are required to be posted on our waiting list. Once these requirements are met, we will contact you to let you know who's available once baby hedgehogs reach 4 weeks of age and are priced and sexed rat selections start at 6 weeks of age after temperament testing. We will contact you via text in order of placement on the waiting list and provide photos and prices on our available babies. The waiting list is the best way to get the baby that you are looking for! Babies posted on the available page have been overlooked by our waiting list, making them available to the general public. We allow 24 hours before we must move to the next adopter on the list, we are always happy to answer questions and send pictures and videos to help you make this decision.

Please note, while additional payments are accepted from our families on the waiting list, they are not expected. If you have decided to go with our waiting list option in order to make payments and offset the expense, you will be in charge of your payment schedule planning. If you are within 7 days of your selected baby's anticipated ready date and cannot pay off your balance at pickup or prior to transport, please let us know as soon as possible. We can forward your payments to a future baby.

If you are on our waiting list and decide to wait another month to select a baby hedgehog, let us know by simply replying “Skip”. When reaching out to our waiting list, if we have a no response in a 24 hour period, you will added to the next selection. We want our families to be 100% happy with the baby they picked. If you have any special requests let us know so that we can match you with the perfect baby, this is the point of our waiting list after all.

We reserve the exclusive right to select babies for our breeding program and other breeders in order to maintain high standards and improve the species. Waiting list deposits and application approvals expire after 12 months.

Health Guarantee and Warranty

Your pet will be healthy, disease-free, and parasite-free at the time of purchase to the best of our knowledge. If your pet is found to be ill, we will take all necessary steps to address the problem as specified in the adoption contract.

Because of the developmental changes that all animals experience, we cannot guarantee specific colors and temperaments. All rats undergo temperament testing before being placed in homes. Any animal with teeth can bite and we are not liable for damages that may happen once an animal leaves our care. We're happy to exchange problematic pets for the safety of our adoptive families.

Occasionally, we may have older or surrendered hedgehogs available for adoption; however, these do not come with health guarantees.

We offer a lifetime warranty for Wobbly Hedgehog Syndrome (WHS) for all hedgehogs born at Coastal Quills. If your hedgehog develops WHS, we will provide a replacement. Please note that WHS can only be confirmed through a licensed professional's animal necropsy report.

If your pet passes away within six months of purchase due to a genetic issue other than WHS, we will replace it with an equal-value hedgehog upon submission of a necropsy report.

This guarantee excludes accidental death or injury, treatable diseases, neglect, abuse, disclosed faults, or veterinary expenses.

Within 7 days of receiving your pet, a veterinary examination is recommended. If any illness or parasites are confirmed during this period and are traced back to Coastal Quills, we will cover the associated medication cost for treatment. Transport voids this clause, due to the risk of stress, exposure to parasites, and exposure to communicable illnesses.

Note that symptoms like wobbliness or limb weakness do not necessarily indicate WHS, which develops gradually. Contact a veterinarian promptly if you observe concerning signs, as they could indicate other health issues.

***Note*** Water bowls can contribute to illnesses. Bowls can be spilled and easily contaminated with urine and feces. Commercial hedgehog food is not an adequate source of nutrition. Malnutrition from commercial hedgehog food can stunt growth, cause weakened immune system and cause foul smelling stools. Feeding commercial hedgehog food or using a bowl to give water is not advised and voids our health guarantees. We find that poor oral health in hedgehogs is not directly linked to the use of water bottles, and is frequently due to neurotic behaviors, poor early nutrition and a substance called biofilm that will buildup in unclean bottles and bowls. Follow care advice on our guides and contact us with questions.

Surrender / Rehoming

Please don't hesitate to return a hedgehog or rat to us if you cannot provide care for it during any stage of its life. You are required to reach out prior to re-homing any hedgehog adopted from Coastal Quills in order for us to transfer our lifetime WHS guarantee and lifelong support to the new owner. You will be asked to send proof of a recent vet record (14 days or less) as proof the hedgehog you are rehoming is in good health. We do not want any hedgehogs rehomed due to the fact the original owner cannot afford medical treatment. We are comfortable taking on these unexpected medical expenses with any surrenders.

If you decide to surrender a hedgehog to us, we do not do "buybacks", due to the expenses associated with housing, treating, and re-homing any hedgehog surrendered. Please know we will take any hedgehog in no questions asked. If you’re far, we will refer you to a local hedgehog rescue that we know will help you!

We reserve the right to rehome any pet surrendered to Coastal Quills after quarantine.

Original Content and Social Media

From time to time we may privately share baby pictures or original content without watermarks to verify ownership of photos. We ask that these photos are not shared online unless we approve the content (this excludes sharing privately with family and friends via email or text at your discretion). Oftentimes we will take pictures in our home so please respect the privacy and safety of our family members. If you have any awesome photos that we took and sent you we can edit to approve for sharing. We work hard to get perfect pictures, and this is to prevent original content from being stolen by scammers! Additionally, we ask that no one attempt to edit our original content to remove our watermarks. Our owners are encouraged to post their own photos on any and all social media and blogs and welcome to tag us on any photos they took and want us to share. Due to a recent increase of hedgehog owner's photos being stolen on Facebook by scammers, we recommend protecting others by adding watermarks an example of this would be photo taken by.... or @instagramusername which usually deters fake pages from trying to use the content to lure unsuspecting victims into believing they can sell them the hedgehog in the photo.