Have you seen any surprising badger behaviour?
This year we're taking an in depth look at badgers. It's becoming clear there's more to badgers than we thought.
We've already seen badgers eating baby rabbits and we're also getting reports from you. jule_s, for one, has a chicken-eating badger in her garden.
Now we'd like to hear from you. Have you seen any badger behaviour that's surprised you? If you have please tell us below.
Update 10th June 2009:
Some really great reports have come in from you about all things badger. There have been a few recurring themes that have stuck out.
One thing many of you have commented on is the reason why we are seeing badgers in our towns and cities. The truth is that they will always have been there. Unlike foxes that are known to give up country living to find vacant territories in towns, some badger setts have been in existence for hundreds of years and it is us that have been expanding our habitations to find ourselves living among them! I used to live in Edinburgh but never saw a badger there (not that I can remember), but there's been a couple of you that have been spotting badgers right in the heart of the city.
Another thing that has really stuck out is the number of people writing in to tell us stories that blow badgers' reputation of being gentle woodland creatures right out of the water! Other than worms and the young rabbits that we saw on the programme being dug out of their nesting chamber, you've been telling us about some of their other surprising dietary addition.
Hedgehogs, chickens, turkeys, bees and possibly even lambs have all been on the menu and reported by people around the country. When you think about it, it's not so surprising - they are large powerful mustelids, a family of animals that specialise hunting other animals!
Over the last couple of weeks filming in Essex I often saw badgers and foxes both scavenging scraps from the streets. From what I saw they seemed to completely ignore each other - neither of them keen to interact or get too close to one another. I've heard of fox and badger cubs being seen playing together but HamiltonGrammer wrote about seeing an adult fox and badger actually sharing a meal from the same foil container.
All I can say is they must have been well fed. I've seen a clip on the internet of a badger absolutely hammering the living daylights out of a fox that got too close to a scattering of peanuts!
There are lots of amazing stories that you have sent in that only remind me of how much more we have to learn about these black and white striped creatures of the night!
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