Conservation & Ecology
approach within a few metres of someone who is well hidden and sitting downwind. Conversely, they appear to be able to pick up new or different silhouettes from twenty metres away in poor light. Watch a badger feeding and it’s apparent
that smell rather than sight is the key to finding inert food, and there is good evidence that sounds inaudible to us - for example the rustle of an insect under moss or leaves, or the slither of an earthworm moving across damp grass - help them locate live food. Unusual sounds - like the snap of a twig, the
rustle of clothing, or a human voice in the quiet of a wood - alert and alarm badgers, whilst commonly heard sounds of passing traffic, dogs barking or planes overhead are usually ignored. Smell is easily the most important of the
Smell is a badger’s most important sense
three senses: it helps them find food, to detect danger, to identify members of their own social group, to follow routes to foraging areas and to recognise the sexual state of other badgers. Experimental work suggests a sense of smell 800 times more acute than humans, and there are numerous reports of badgers following the same line of scent trails even when, days or weeks earlier, the trails have been ploughed in and apparently destroyed. Damp, humid conditions hold scents more
Sensory identification is achieved by musking “
Badgers follow the same line of scent trails even when, days or weeks earlier, the trails have been ploughed in and apparently destroyed
readily than dry, arid days and the badger’s ability to distinguish a familiar human scent from one that’s unfamiliar is well demonstrated when strangers first join a badger-watching group and are greeted with alarm or an unusual degree of caution. The ability to recognise, by smell, individual members of the same social group is vital to badgers as, for the most part, they reject - and often fight fiercely with - badgers of the same sex from different social groups. This sensory identification is achieved by musking. A pale yellow, fatty substance released from sub- caudal glands just below the tail is used to mark other badgers in the same social group. All members of a social group musk each other (usually one backs up, tail raised, to the other), but it is especially common during the mating season when the dominant boars frequently mark sows in their social group. Musking is frequent on objects around a sett and on regularly used trails which lead to and from the main setts. Badgers also have anal glands which
discharge a yellowish-brown substance with a rank smell and it appears likely that this liquid gives faeces a smell which other members of the same group recognise.
Well bred
Badgers mate at almost any time of the year but, thanks to an unusual reproductive technique known as delayed implantation, they have only one litter a year. Litter size ranges from one to five cubs, with two or three the more common. Cubs are born in chambers lined with any available suitable bedding material that the sows can gather and drag into the breeding chamber. Straw, hay, grass and fern are all commonly used, along with a wide range of green plants which heat up and give off warmth. In the Midlands and the south of England, most cubs are born in
116 I PC DECEMBER/JANUARY 2016
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