Badger facts

• Badgers are prime diggers, and natural architects. They can craft homes of tunnel networks, or “setts”, which run hundreds of metres long.¹
• They are ecosystem engineers, and their setts provide habitat for other wildlife.²
• While being territorial, badgers are surprisingly social. They make frequent excursions to visit other badgers.³
• Badger setts can be hundreds of years old.⁴
• A badger will cozy-up its burrow by adding dry grass to sleeping quarters, which remain consistently warm all year round.⁵
• European badgers love foraging for worms. An adult can eat one hundred in one night!⁶
• Female badgers can carry cubs from multiple sires (breeding male badger) in a single litter and exert amazing control over their pregnancies.⁷

Described as “omnivores”, badgers will chow down on a variety of foods including grains, wheat, invertebrates and fruits.⁸ Their food pyramid is a big one!

Badgers also eat a variety of animal and plant species. They enjoy hundreds of different insect species as well as molluscs. Their wide diet – including a taste for meat – makes them the UK’s largest predator. The European badger has also been recorded to eat 45 different species of bird and is the only native predator of hedgehogs in the UK.⁹ 

While birds and hedgehogs make up a small proportion of badger diets, some studies from the Mediterranean have shown that when food is scarce, these mysterious opportunists can dig underground to reach live rabbit litters.¹⁰

In general, worms have the most to fear. Earthworms are a European badger’s “bread and butter”. In spring and early summer, these slimy invertebrates can make up 80 percent of a badger's diet.¹¹ A single badger can slurp up over one hundred worms in a single night.

Some studies have shown that even the presence – or lack of – worms can indicate the number of badgers in an area.¹² In other words, if earthworms don’t like the area, badgers won’t like it either. Earthworms are common in pasture and old forests, where badgers love to build their setts.

Badgers spend most of their time in their setts – subterranean networks that can be anything between a simple, single entrance chamber or hundreds of metres of underground tunnels connected to dozens of chambers. The largest sets can have over 100 entrances, and are usually built in sandy soils – which are softer and easier for badgers to dig out.

These underground mansions can be passed down from generation to generation, with some instances of setts being centuries years old.¹³

Their burrows are the backdrop for up to three quarters of a badger's life. They are used for winter sleep, rest and reproduction.¹⁴ They remain consistently warm throughout the year and their sleeping quarters are full of grass, acting as dry, hay bedding.¹⁵

Setts typically follow land contours, and don’t stray too far from the surface – they are usually about one metre underground. They prefer to dig into south and west-facing slopes, which tend to be warmer and drier as they’d face the sun.¹⁶ As subterranean dwellers, they must be aware of groundwater levels. Most setts are built where water levels are low. They wouldn't want a wet house!

Eurasian and hog badgers are woodland animals. The number of setts in an area often goes hand in hand with the amount of forest cover.¹⁷ More woodland means a higher density of badgers.

Badger species are threatened by human activity. Asian badgers and Japanese badgers, for example, are victims of poaching for the meat and medicine markets.¹⁸ Hog badgers, meanwhile, are classed as a vulnerable species due to pressure of dog hunts and snare-trapping.¹⁹

To try and decrease these pressures, badger species are legally protected in several countries. India and Thailand forbid hunting, killing or capturing hog badgers, while South Korea forbids poaching of Asian badgers.²⁰

In many European countries, including Italy, Spain and Denmark, it is illegal to kill badgers, while in the UK, it is also illegal to damage their setts.¹⁹ While endangered in Europe, they are hunted in almost seventy percent of the continent for some portion of the year.²¹ In the UK, culls take place each year as a controversial management tool against the spread of bovine tuberculosis²²

Many scientists have argued that badgers play a vital role in ecosystems worth conserving – some claim that badgers are “ecosystem engineers”.²³ It’s believed that badgers offer a diversity boost for the surrounding environment by helping with seed and spore dispersal, pollination and soil nutrient cycling.

One fascinating way that badgers boost biodiversity is the way their setts are often shared with other species such as raccoon dogs, red foxes and rabbits.²⁴ Digging is taxing for animals, so it makes sense survival-wise to find housemates.²⁵

Another way badgers boost biodiversity is through the act of digging itself. When badgers burrow, they churn up the soil, which mixes in air and surface vegetation in with the lower layers – like mixing ingredients for a cake.²⁶ By doing so, the animals improve soil for microbes and invertebrates. Some experts claim that the effect is so pronounced, badger setts become ecological hotspots, providing important niches for a wider variety of plant and soil organisms.²⁷

Badger is a catch-all term for animals with similar appearance and burrowing lifestyle that are actually distantly related from one another. There are sixteen species named badger, and each are short, stocky mammals that are excellent diggers.²⁸ They have snouts (like a dog) but much shorter and wider bodies, complete with thick fur and strong claws.

All badgers are in the Mustelidae family, the largest mammal group in the animal kingdom which also includes otters, weasels, martens and wolverines.²⁹

Other species that are not considered part of the true badger family are ferret-badgers, which are smaller and ferret-like, and the honey badger, a fierce ground-dwelling carnivore in Africa.³⁰

“True badgers” belong to the genus meles (the classic badgers) and arctonyx (the hog badgers). The meles badgers include the European badger, the Asian badger, the Caucasian badger and the Japanese badger.³¹ Hog badgers comprise the greater hog badger, the northern hog badger and the Sumatran hog badger.

Badgers are generally medium-sized mammals with snouts (like a dog), short, stocky and wide bodies with thick fur. Badgers have different colouring, but generally their fur is black, white and brown. Almost everything about a badger’s appearance comes down to one activity: digging. Badgers have uniquely powerful chests and shoulders, which help them to pummel down into topsoil.³² The claws on their front paws are long and are resilient to wearing down.

European badgers may be the most recognizable, thanks to their black-and-white “masks”. Over their white faces, they have black or dark-brown stripes that start at the snout, race back over their eyes and ears. The dark stripes sandwich a pure white stripe on the nose, which extends almost to the shoulders. Why exactly badgers have face masks is still a mystery, and some scientists have suggested it is a warning to predators.³³

Compared to their European cousins, Japanese badgers are smaller and almost entirely brown. Their face markings are less distinctive. Hog badgers, in another genus altogether, have a conical, pig-like nose. In all species of both genera, the nose is flexible. All the better for rooting out worms.³⁴

A group of badgers is known as a cete, or a clan, which is made up of male boars, female sows and baby cubs. In fact, the group-making behaviour of some species is what sets badgers apart from other mammals. European badgers are particularly social, and they share dens between three and twenty-seven individuals even though they forage alone.³⁵

Badgers can see, but their vision is limited. They are mostly nocturnal, which means their eyes are better adapted for the darkness of night. A moonless night is 100 billion times darker than direct sunlight.³⁶ How do they sense the world around them in such conditions?

Badgers have larger and more curved eyeballs, which allow their eyes to collect as much available light. Most mammal eyeballs have rod and cone cells to interpret light. Cones can handle colour, while rods are much more sensitive to light and movement. Badgers have a much higher rod to cone ratio, which helps them see in low light at the expense of colour vision. They can probably see blues and yellows, but not red (like dogs).³⁷

It is thought that vision plays a secondary role to a badger’s incredibly strong sense of smell.³⁸ Some estimates have ranked badger smelling power at 750 times stronger than a human’s. Research has found compelling evidence that badgers use their sense of smell and a special gland in their backsides to communicate all kinds of information about individuals and their clan.³⁹ They stamp the environment with this smelly ID card and, in a process known as allo-marking, mark each other too.⁴⁰

Badger sows are remarkable as they have a lot of control over their own reproduction process. Through a process called ‘delayed implantation’, a female badger can carry an already fertilised egg over 11 months. This egg may from any number of its different mating encounters.

While the eggs have already begun their process of dividing and multiplying cells, they remain dormant until the badger is ready to hunker down for the winter season, usually around December.⁴¹ With a six-to-eight-week pregnancy, this means the badger will have cubs born in the spring. Only two percent of mammals are thought to show this adaptation, including some deer and seal species.⁴²

Delayed implantation has a few evolutionary advantages. First, as males can be known to kill the offspring of a competitor, delayed implantation could protect cubs from danger – a single badger litter may even carry individual cubs from multiple fathers.⁴³ Secondly, delayed implantation means badger babies emerge during the springtime, when there is the highest availability of food for them to thrive on.⁴⁴

Badgers can climb to varying degrees according to their species, but they are generally poor climbers. Scientists have observed Asian badgers climbing trees in the wild two and half metres above the ground.⁴⁵

For most, climbs are a bit humbler. European badgers can hop onto tree trunks and hoist themselves up to animal feeding troughs around 100 centimetres above the ground, but that’s about it. Most of their food is thought to be scavenged at ground level.⁴⁶

Different badger species are more at risk than others, and in the past – they have been put at risk by human hunting or persecution. Badgers are coveted for a very specific product – shaving brushes. The soft and water-retaining hairs have been used to lather shaving cream for hundreds of years.⁴⁷

All three Meles subspecies (the European badger, the Asian badger and the Japanese badger) come under Least Concern by the IUCN. That said, the European badger has been intensely persecuted in “badger baiting” practices over the centuries, where dogs are made to fight badgers out of dens for bloodsport. The illegal practice has resulted in badger protections. In many countries it is illegal to kill badgers or tamper with their setts.⁴⁸

Nonetheless, due to their status as carriers of bovine tuberculosis, badgers are also legally killed as part of government-mandated culls.⁴⁹ These yearly culls remain controversial as scientific findings have reported few observable benefits against the spread of the disease.⁵⁰ Some have even reported that the culls encourage spread. Culls disrupt badger social structures and territories, encouraging them to move around and come into contact with cattle – increase the risk of transmission.⁵¹

The greater hog badger, which lives in tropical forests of Southeast Asia, is now considered a vulnerable species due to pressure from the hunting and wildlife trade as well as habitat loss. In recent years, scientists have emphasised that climate change will cause further and substantial projected declines in the coming decades. The Sumatran hog badger, the smaller, browner variant, is still considered of least concern, but numbers are not well known. It is hunted for bushmeat and medicines.⁵²

Featured image © Shutterstock

Fun fact image © Shutterstock

Quick Facts

1. Sato, Jun J. 2016. “The Systematics and Taxonomy of the World’s Badger Species – a Review.” August 8, 2016. https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Jun-Sato-10/publication/307973727_…; “Badger Types, Habitat & Diet | Study.com.” 2025. Study.com. 2025. https://study.com/academy/lesson/badger-diet-habitat-types.html;

2. Zhou, Youbing, Wenwen Chen, Yayoi Kaneko, Chris Newman, Zhonghua Liao, Xiaoqin Zhu, Christina D Buesching, Zongqiang Xie, and David W Macdonald. 2014. “Seasonal Dietary Shifts and Food Resource Exploitation by the Hog Badger;

(Arctonyx Collaris) in a Chinese Subtropical Forest.” European Journal of Wildlife Research 61 (1): 125–33. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10344-014-0881-5; Hounsom, Tim and Richard Delahay. 2005. “Birds in the Diet of the Eurasian Badger Meles Meles: A Review and Meta-Analysis.” Mammal Review 35 (2): 199–209. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2907.2004.00061.x;

3. Team, What Eats. 2024. “What Eats a Badger? What Does a Badger Eat? | What Eats.” What Eats What? October 4, 2024. https://whateats.com/what-eats-a-badger;

4. DAERA. 2015. “Advice on Badgers | Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs.” DAERA. May 6, 2015. https://www.daera-ni.gov.uk/articles/advice-badgers;

5. “Arctonyx Collaris, Hog Badger.” 2025. Thai National Parks. 2025. https://www.thainationalparks.com/species/hog-badger; “Greater Hog Badger (Arctonyx Collaris).” 2019. INaturalist. 2019. https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/569409-Arctonyx-collaris;

6. “Badgers – Genuine Mustelids.” 2024. Genuinemustelids.org. 2024. https://www.genuinemustelids.org/family/badgers;

Fact File

1. Coombes, Martin A., and Heather A. Viles. 2015. “Population-Level Zoogeomorphology: The Case of the Eurasian Badger (Meles MelesL.).” Physical Geography 36 (3): 215–38. https://doi.org/10.1080/02723646.2015.1026170;

2. Kurek, Przemysław, Łukasz Piechnik, Blanka Wiatrowska, Agnieszka Ważna, Krzysztof Nowakowski, Xosé Pardavila, Jan Cichocki, and Barbara Seget. 2022. “Badger Meles Meles as Ecosystem Engineer and Its Legal Status in Europe.” Animals 12 (7): 898. https://doi.org/10.3390/ani12070898; Mori, Emiliano, Mattia Menchetti, and Alessandro Balestrieri. 2014. “Interspecific Den Sharing: A Study on European Badger Setts Using Camera Traps.” Acta Ethologica 18 (2): 121–26. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10211-014-0197-1;

3. Kelly, David J, Aoibheann Gaughran, Enda Mullen, Teresa MacWhite, Peter Maher, Margaret Good, and Nicola M Marples. 2020. “Extra Territorial Excursions by European Badgers Are Not Limited by Age, Sex or Season.” Scientific Reports 10 (1). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-66809-w;

4. Sidorchuk, Natalia V., Michail V. Maslov, and Vyacheslav V. Rozhnov. 2015. “Role of Badger Setts in Life of Other Carnivores.” Studia Ecologiae et Bioethicae 13 (1): 81–95. https://doi.org/10.21697/seb.2015.13.1.04;

5. Tsunoda, Marie, Chris Newman, Christina D. Buesching, David W. Macdonald, and Yayoi Kaneko. 2018. “Badger Setts Provide Thermal Refugia, Buffering Changeable Surface Weather Conditions.” Journal of Thermal Biology 74 (May): 226–33. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jtherbio.2018.04.005; François, Lebourgeois. 2021. “Long-Term Monitoring of Activities of Badgers (Meles Meles L.) in a Broadleaved Forest in France.” European Journal of Wildlife Research 67 (1). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10344-020-01447-1;

6. Woodland Trust. 2019. “BADGER.” Woodland Trust. 2019. https://www.woodlandtrust.org.uk/trees-woods-and-wildlife/animals/mammals/badger;

7. Corner, Leigh A. L., Lynsey J. Stuart, David J. Kelly, and Nicola M. Marples. 2015. “Reproductive Biology Including Evidence for Superfetation in the European Badger Meles Meles (Carnivora: Mustelidae).” Edited by Tapio Mappes. PLOS ONE 10 (10): e0138093. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0138093;

8. Zhou, Youbing, Wenwen Chen, Yayoi Kaneko, Chris Newman, Zhonghua Liao, Xiaoqin Zhu, Christina D Buesching, Zongqiang Xie, and David W Macdonald. 2014. “Seasonal Dietary Shifts and Food Resource Exploitation by the Hog Badger (Arctonyx Collaris) in a Chinese Subtropical Forest.” European Journal of Wildlife Research 61 (1): 125–33. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10344-014-0881-5;

9. Hounsom, Tim and Richard Delahay. 2005. “Birds in the Diet of the Eurasian Badger Meles Meles: A Review and Meta-Analysis.” Mammal Review 35 (2): 199–209. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2907.2004.00061.x;

10. Hounsom, Tim and Richard Delahay. 2005. “Birds in the Diet of the Eurasian Badger Meles Meles: A Review and Meta-Analysis.” Mammal Review 35 (2): 199–209. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2907.2004.00061.x; Martín, Rosalía, Alejandro Rodríguez, and Miguel Delibes. 1995. “Local Feeding Specialization by Badgers (Meles Meles) in a Mediterranean Environment.” Oecologia 101 (1): 45–50. https://doi.org/10.1007/bf00328898;

11. Woodland Trust. 2019. “BADGER.” Woodland Trust. 2019. https://www.woodlandtrust.org.uk/trees-woods-and-wildlife/animals/mammals/badger;

12. Piza-Roca, C., M. La Haye, and E. Jongejans. 2015. “Environmental Drivers of the Distribution and Density of the European Badger (Meles Meles): A Review.” 109. https://hdl.handle.net/2066/149829;

13. Sidorchuk, Natalia V., Michail V. Maslov, and Vyacheslav V. Rozhnov. 2015. “Role of Badger Setts in Life of Other Carnivores.” Studia Ecologiae et Bioethicae 13 (1): 81–95. https://doi.org/10.21697/seb.2015.13.1.04;

14. Newman, David. 2022. Badgers of Wytham Woods : A Model for Behaviour, Ecology, and Evolution. S.L.: Oxford Univ Press. https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-badgers-of-wytham-woods-9780192845368?cc=gb&lang=en&;

15. Tsunoda, Marie, Chris Newman, Christina D. Buesching, David W. Macdonald, and Yayoi Kaneko. 2018. “Badger Setts Provide Thermal Refugia, Buffering Changeable Surface Weather Conditions.” Journal of Thermal Biology 74 (May): 226–33. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jtherbio.2018.04.005; François, Lebourgeois. 2021. “Long-Term Monitoring of Activities of Badgers (Meles Meles L.) in a Broadleaved Forest in France.” European Journal of Wildlife Research 67 (1). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10344-020-01447-1;

16. Piza-Roca, C., M. La Haye, and E. Jongejans. 2015. “Environmental Drivers of the Distribution and Density of the European Badger (Meles Meles): A Review.” 109. https://hdl.handle.net/2066/149829;

17. Kurek, Przemysław, Blanka Wiatrowska, Agnieszka Ważna, and Hans Vink. 2024. “Setts of European Badger Meles Meles in Open Habitats: Trend or Exception?” Mammal Review, June. https://doi.org/10.1111/mam.12373;

18. Elves-Powell, Joshua, Xavier Neo, Sehee Park, Rosie Woodroffe, Hang Lee, Jan C. Axmacher, and Sarah M. Durant. 2023. “A Preliminary Assessment of the Wildlife Trade in Badgers (Meles Leucurus and Arctonyx Spp.) (Carnivora: Mustelidae) in South Korea.” Journal of Asia-Pacific Biodiversity16 (2): 204–14. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.japb.2023.03.004; Kaneko, Yayoi, Christina D. Buesching, and Chris Newman. 2017. “Unjustified Killing of Badgers in Kyushu.” Nature 544 (7649): 161–61. https://doi.org/10.1038/544161a; Hornyak, Tim. 2017. “Japanese Badgers in Cull ‘Crisis.’” Tim Hornyak. June 9, 2017. https://timhornyak.com/japanese-badgers-in-cull-crisis;

19. Cao, Long, Russell Gray, Thong Pham, Mai Trinh, Tan Nguyen, Huyen Nguyen, Daniel Willcox, and Thai Nguyen. 2024. “Records of Greater Hog Badger Arctonyx Collaris from Northern Vietnam and a Discussion of Its Status in the Country.” Small Carnivore Conservation 61 (April). https://smallcarnivoreconservation.com/index.php/sccg/article/view/3688;

20. Elves-Powell, Joshua, Xavier Neo, Sehee Park, Rosie Woodroffe, Hang Lee, Jan C. Axmacher, and Sarah M. Durant. 2023. “A Preliminary Assessment of the Wildlife Trade in Badgers (Meles Leucurus and Arctonyx Spp.) (Carnivora: Mustelidae) in South Korea.” Journal of Asia-Pacific Biodiversity 16 (2): 204–14. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.japb.2023.03.004;

21. Kurek, Przemysław, Łukasz Piechnik, Blanka Wiatrowska, Agnieszka Ważna, Krzysztof Nowakowski, Xosé Pardavila, Jan Cichocki, and Barbara Seget. 2022. “Badger Meles Meles as Ecosystem Engineer and Its Legal Status in Europe.” Animals 12 (7): 898. https://doi.org/10.3390/ani12070898;

22. Prior, Malcolm. 2024. “Badger Culling to End in England within Five Years.” BBC News. BBC News. August 30, 2024. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c9qg52r7jzxo; Torgerson, Paul R., Sonja Hartnack, Philip Rasmussen, Fraser I. Lewis, Peter O’Donnell, and Thomas E. S. Langton. 2025. “Randomised Badger Culling Trial—No Effects of Widespread Badger Culling on Tuberculosis in Cattle: Comment on Mills, Woodroffe and Donnelly (2024a, 2024b).” Royal Society Open Science 12 (6). https://doi.org/10.1098/rsos.241609;

23. Kurek, Przemysław, Łukasz Piechnik, Blanka Wiatrowska, Agnieszka Ważna, Krzysztof Nowakowski, Xosé Pardavila, Jan Cichocki, and Barbara Seget. 2022. “Badger Meles Meles as Ecosystem Engineer and Its Legal Status in Europe.” Animals 12 (7): 898. https://doi.org/10.3390/ani12070898;

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26. Kurek, Przemysław, Paweł Kapusta, and Jan Holeksa. 2013. “Burrowing by Badgers (Meles Meles) and Foxes (Vulpes Vulpes) Changes Soil Conditions and Vegetation in a European Temperate Forest.” Ecological Research 29 (1): 1–11. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11284-013-1094-1; Kurek, Przemysław, and Beata Cykowska-Marzencka. 2016. “Badger Meles Meles Setts and Bryophyte Diversity: A Newly Found Role for the Game Animal in European Temperate Forests.” Forest Ecology and Management 372 (July): 199–205. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foreco.2016.04.021; Kurek, Przemysław. 2019. “Topsoil Mixing or Fertilization? Forest Flora Changes in the Vicinity of Badgers’ (Meles Meles L.) Setts and Latrines.” Plant and Soil 437 (1-2): 327–40. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11104-019-03984-4;

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