Badgers and Monarch Butterflies

Last night (Sunday through Monday) I went out to check on the Badgers. As I was walking down towards the river, I bumped into the Labrador owner that I had met while trying to film the otters. After a brief chat about what I was up to she told me that I was a real Richard Attenborough. Now as he is the film director that made the film Gandhi among others, I was not sure if she meant his brother David, who has delighted so many with his wildlife films. Well I will have to ask her the next time I see her. When we talked though I discovered that her Otter watching was impromptu, and had only seen the Otters by chance when walking her dog. She admitted that had she wanted to really make the effort to see them then the dog would have to stay at home.

The main reason I wanted to check on how the Badgers are doing is since the flooding of the main sett in the September flood, the dynamics of the groupings have changed. The main sett however has not been abandoned and two young males (at least) have reoccupied the sett. They were two males from another Sett that I called Itchy and Scratchy (what does that reveal about my cultural references?). Between them they are showing quite a remarkable degree of cooperation, re digging tunnels and collecting bedding. But what is unusual is that unlike most young male badgers they are not engaging in the play fighting that is a normal feature of badger behaviour. Now I am not saying that its not happening, just that I am not seeing it. It could be that they are just to busy to play, or play as much.

While I have not seen a female there, yet, I suspect that this effort is because of a female. But as they are still to young to be mating themselves, they are just nine or ten months old, I am finding the activity rather perplexing. As while I do think there are or will be other more mature badgers there too, it is strange to see young males so intent on the task of rebuilding the sett.

When I got home and started typing up my notes, I started playing one of the podcasts that I listen to. Birds and Nature from a Pittsburgh radio station, via I Tunes. Well the writer of one of the Web Logs that I follow, and I told my regular reader about was a guest on the show, Ba Rea, the writer of the Monarch Chaser Blog. It was quite an entertaining interview too.

Thus, my note making got left a little but I got them done before getting on with sorting out more video footage. I am aware that the best way to get it all sorted out would be to stop filming until I have got my backlog catalogued and backed up, but that would be no fun. I just seem to like giving myself work to do.