 The
Badger
Ireland’s rural landscape is littered with the homes of
badgers who are fiercely territorial creatures.
Referred to by country folk as ‘brock’, the badger has
long suffered at the hands of landowners and sportsmen.
In the middle of the 20th century they were
thought to be the carrier of tuberculosis, which was
subsequently transmitted to cattle. Their
persecution was relentless and their numbers in Ireland
dipped as a result. Protection was afforded to badgers
in the 1970s and since then their numbers have started
to recovered.
Their home, referred to as a ‘set’, is a complicated
tunnel construction where the female or ‘sow’ raises up
to three cubs each year during February or March.
Badger set can be as much as twenty metres long and be
several metres below the surface
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