Patience with the Badgers

A week of showery and cool weather was at last due for a change. This evening was going to be bright and a good deal warmer so I knew the Badgers would be out earlier. We have a handful of setts on the estate but this one is in an ideal posistion, tucked away well into the wood but on the facing bank of small open sand pit, which many years back had a few tree stumps pushed into it after the clear up from storm damage.

The Badgers moved in there about two years ago. Last year I had a few good evenings watching them in the early part of summer until the bracken grew too much and hid them from view. They had three cubs then, but so far I had not seen any this year, but the signs were looking promising as recent activity suggested that cubs were now up above ground.

It is fairly easy to sit up against a tree a photograph them providing of course they don't come out too late. But this year I had put a scaffold tower up to get a better view and to make sure my scent is always above them. Every couple of days or so I go and throw down a couple of handfuls of peanuts and the occasional egg from the chickens just to hold thier interest around the sett and to help with getting them relatively still for a photograph.

I got to the sett in plenty of time as usual and quietly climbed into the tower and settled down. Everything settled down around me and I was soon seeing the usual Chiffchaff and Willow Warblers all around, in and out of the trees looking for insects and caterpillars. Every so often a Bank Vole would come scurrying out of the tree stumps and pinch a peanut before quickly scurrying back, in case the Barn Owl came through off the meadows. I often see the Barn Owl come through while I am sitting there as he is busy feeding the female on her eggs out the other side of the wood.

A Wren was busy searching for food in the bracken around and beneath the tower, as she was feeding young in a nest she had made in the low bracken just behind the tower not twenty feet away. Suddenly there was movement at the mouth of one of the holes. Although I was in an elevated positon, I could not see down into the hole but from experience knew to look for the vegetation moving on top of the hole as to signal the emergence of a Badger.

And sure enough, slowly but surely the head of a Badger appeared scenting the air as it came. This was the sow and most often than not the boar would be right behind her. And yes there was another right behind her. But as it emerged it was evident it was not the boar but at last a cub! It was a lot more on edge than its mother but was more or less pushed out by indeed the boar following hard behind it.

They all started foraging around finding some of the peanuts I had thrown down. The cub and the boar were in and out of the hole quite a bit and eventually disappeared back down leaving the sow out and feeding by herself. I had been concentrating on taking pictures of her as she was more out in the open, so I could not honestly say wether it was the same cub in and out or different individuals. She stayed out for about twenty minutes or so giving me some great opportunities before she wandered back down the same hole. I took my chance grateful at what I had got, and slipped away quietly.