Meeting with a family of badgers

The European badger (Meles meles) is a member of the Mustelidae family, which also includes martens, pine martens and otters. It is stocky and short-legged, reaching 70 cm in length and weighing around twenty kilograms.

His body is gray, black and white. He is a nocturnal animal with his routine. My observations have shown me that he can be very regular about his waking and sleeping times.

Another is the small holes in the fields. He likes to look for earthworms especially after a rainy day because the soil is softer and the worms come up.

I then looked for the characteristic traces of comings and goings, leafless paths with compacted earth. Once all this is in mind, it remains to know the habits of our family of Badgers before going there so as not to disturb them during the hides.

Information gathering

As with most of the animal photographs I take, patience and gathering information is the priority to avoid stressing or frightening the animal. I photograph living beings that do not necessarily want to be disturbed, so I must respect their tranquility as much as possible.

To retrieve information, I use a camera trap (or camera trap) which is very useful because it can take videos at night. It detects nearby movements and triggers the video, this allows me to retrieve all kinds of information:

• The times of exits and returns to the burrow
• The number of individuals
• The direction of the route
• What happens at this place (is it a crossing point, a feeding place, a grooming place, etc.)
• Particular behaviors
• …

Result after several hides, this one did not come out in front of me as I imagined, it was by hearing the cows in the field nearby that I saw the small gray spot along the fence wire:

To know him a little more

Its robust, clawed legs and small, conical head suggest an adaptation to a burrowing life.

It is omnivorous but its diet adapts to the seasons. By digging and rooting in the ground, the badger contributes to the aeration of the forest floor, thus contributing to soil enrichment and biodiversity.

They dig their own burrows. They extend over several meters and have many rooms. They can live in these burrows for several years, and this underground network becomes a real family home, where young badgers grow and learn to survive. Some observations have shown that badgers can coexist with other species in their burrows, including foxes.

I also happened to be faced with a rather comical situation, well installed, in advance and camouflaged in my hide, I was placed facing the wind (very important for the hide because the badger has a very good sense of smell), it so happens that a member of the burrow came a few meters from me to do its business because badgers have the equivalent of our toilets. Fortunately, the wind was not in its direction it was not disturbed by my presence and continued its night, for my part I was able to enjoy the smell before my departure.