It has always amused me that the tourists to the US that I’ve spoken to are often very excited to see raccoons, and disappointed if they don’t see them before they leave.
Some others I’ve noticed on the east coast of the US are blue jays and cardinals. Boy, do people get excited about those if they’ve never seen them before! Very pretty birds of course, just very easy to get used to and see as uninteresting as well.
Wait wait, are you telling me the US (the Americas?) don’t have hedgehogs??
Nope. There used to be some that went extinct millions of years before humans arrived.
There are porcupines though, but I haven’t seen them in the wild yet.
Surprisingly, porcupines and hedgehogs are not closely related
That’s so interesting! Changes my perspective on an animal that has always felt like a perfectly normal neighbour everywhere I’ve lived (though seeing them is still kind of a rare thing).