I received quite an unexpected bonus, when I reviewed last week's badger footage. One video had two badgers together. Like, I mean they were together, rather than two badgers that met unexpectedly.

The only badgers I am aware of that I've seen go around like this are/were Itchy and Scrawny tail.
Though, it could be sheer coincidence, and this is another pair of badgers. However, in this first video you can just make out a badger having scratch on the other side of the fence; exactly as Itchy did.

In this second video, a few seconds after the first, a large badger, reminiscent of Itchy comes under the fence. Behind it, is a smaller, more wary badger. This is reminiscent of Scrawny tail.  Sadly, this badger came under the fence (or not) whilst my trail cam was having a 30 second rest.

This next sequence films the badgers after they have come under the fence. Do not worry about the slight discrepancy in times. Clocks on trail cams are notoriously bad at keeping time. They drift atrociously.

Suffice to say, the first badger under the fence settles down to a good, vigorous scratch, much like Itchy. The second badger follows through and then climbs all over Itchy followed by a quick anal rub, pretty much how Scrawny tail used to behave.

This second badger does not sport a scrawny tail. However, it is possible that Scrawny tail's tail has filled out over the months.  

This badger continues to have a thoroughly good scratch.

Two paws not enough. Let's move up a gear and use all four.

Rain! We had rain. Actual downpour stuff, not the brief drizzle we've had uptil now. Garden's still looking sorry for itself.

Badger activity continues unabated. I think there might be three of them. Two of them come across a field and slip under the fence above the 'outlier' sett. A third tends to not go under the fence, but has been investigating the main sett.

The third badger has an injured leg. Here it is, investigating the main sett. Its left hind leg isn't moving correctly, and it plonks itself down in front of a trail cam. We've seen this badger do exactly the same action at the 'outlier' sett.

In this next video, you can clearly see the badger lifting and placing it rear left leg ever so carefully.

Now, over to the 'outlier' sett, which has been a hive of activity. Shame I didn't put a trail cam out on this 'sett' sooner. This video shows a badger having a dig. I dig put hedgehog food down this sett, but the badger totally ignored it. Not the fox, though, which visited this sett numerous times during the week.

I did not put any food down the sett, this week. I figure there are enough berries, fruit and nuts to keep badgers full. Getting worms should be easier, as the heavy rain has softened the ground slightly and will have persuaded worms to come nearer the ground surface.

And a second go at digging, plus a bit of investigation.

Nice, clear shots of badger.

A nice evening video - well sort of morning for a badger.

Ten minutes later, another badger, I reckon.

On Saturday 5th July, I added a second trail cam to a sett where badgers duck under a fence. I mounted the trail cam on a bit of scrap timber, with sharpen end, and used an old mount. Said mount is a right pain. I keeps coming loose. Therefore I couldn't get the trail cam to point at a downward angle, and so the thing missed all badger and fox action. I shall try an replace the mount this tomorrow. 

On Monday 7th I went back to this under the fence sett and poured some old hedgehog food down it. It's deemed OK to do this when times are tough for badgers, which it is due to the continuing drought. Worms, a principal diet of badgers, burrow deep underground. This, coupled with rock solid ground, makes life difficult for badgers.

See what happens next.

Our badger decides to investigate a new object in its space. My trail cam on a post.

Our badger decides to investigate the sett. I've seen badgers behave like this quite often. Investigate a sett, then ignore it. On the other hand, they will sometimes inspect a sett numerous times, and then move in.

Late that evening, our badger heads back under the fence enroute to its foraging ground. Sorry for quality of video, but the UsoGood trail cams really are quite rubbish. The sensor is too optimistic about the video/ISO capabilities of its camera and video, so it doesn't turn on its IR lights. You just have to squint to see a badger.

The badger realises there is something interesting smelling in the sett.

What spooked our badger? Was it this fox? Was it another badger? Was it something else?

The badger left pretty quickly - the 30 seconds the trail cam goes to sleep, before waking up again. I do this to prevent lots of empty videos. The down side is that it can miss vital action.

Three minutes after this video, a fox turns up.

The fox investigates the sett for the interesting smelling food, but it doesn't stay for some reason. Maybe a badger spooked it? This is one nervous fox, as you'll see.

The fox returns five hours later, and it is very, very, very wary. For why?

Well, the UsoGood trail cam has 'low glow' IR lights. Yeah, right! The things look pretty bright even to my fairly useless human eyes. Even worse, the lights are two red dots roughly two inches apart.

They look like red eyes.

​No wonder the fox is nervous.

This behaviour went on or several minutes, with the fox making multiple attempts to screw up enough courage to get to the food it so desperately wants.

Finally, the fox plucks up enough courage to get some food from the sett. But it didn't hang around for long.

Hunger, and a lack of anything horrible happening by the owner of the scary eyes, wins over its caution.

The fox, a juvenile I believe, is still wary of the scary eyes, but feels more confident to feed.

Now the fox is no longer scared of the eyes, but still has normal wariness of any threat around it.
​

Action now moves to daytime. Our fox is braver, simply as it cannot see scary red eyes.

There was a lot more of this action, with the fox going all the way into the sett until it was satisfied there was no more food to be had.

Meanwhile, our badger was fairly oblivious to what was happening. It could smell fox, though.

Now some more daytime footage of badgers. Well, it's probably the same badger, but badgers sounds better as they could be different. A whole host of badgers seem to come through here.

And finally, I swapped the trail cam mount on post supporting the left hand trail cam. The blasted lock nut kept coming lose, and the whole trail cam flops down. I've also got it to point in a better direction. It's been pointing at a coppiced tree all week.  Secondly, I've increased both the video and image resolution of the UsoGood trail cam, the one opposite the sett hole. Hopefully, the imagery will be better.

I also put more hedgehog food down the hole.

Conditions are getting tougher by the day for all animals, including badgers. No appreciable rain for months. Ground getting rock hard, cracking all over, while worms burrow further down. On the plus side, for badgers, there is healthy crop of berries (if a little unripe), with the possibility of many seeds and fruit e.g. great crop of cherry plums. Insects are also quite numerous, if badgers don't mind crunchy beetles.

Comings and goings at our sett areas are a lot lower. Of Itchy and Scrawny tail there appears to be no sign. They are frequenting pastures and foraging areas new.

However, there is the possibility of a new badger on the block. Let's start with this possible, new interloper, who might become resident.

This badger appears to have a short, squat face; though this might simply be the camera angle. Previous badgers appear to have longer faces.

This badger also spends a lot of time sniffing the area, then scent marks, before proceeding to the left of this image. Badgers uptil now have disappeared under the fence.

I think this is one of our usual badgers. It now takes a really good sniff of the area, taking in the aroma of the scent marking, before disappearing under the fence. As you can see, it is a day later.

I now have a conundrum. Is this our new badger or is it one of the resident badgers that is using a sett entrance just uphill of our main sett?

In terms of getting to the hole under the fence, the badger simply walks along a path right up against the fence behind trees and shrubs bordering the footpath.

Whilst there is a video of a badger disappearing under the fence, it is at a later time of 5:50. Though this is easily explained by the awful time keeping of the trail cams. They drift badly.

This badger is passing through very late. It's been light for 1 1/2 almost 2 hours. I wonder if foraging for food is proving difficult in this dry weather. The rain, projected for this weekend, isn't going to amount to much. Just sufficient to push humidity up. I wonder if I should put food out for the badgers? I know the ideal spot, unfrequented by foxes, normally. Though dogs could still probably sniff out the food (hedgehog and cat dry food) from the footpath. I could bung the stuff down the sett entrance under the fence.

Timings of photographs and videos from last week indicate at least two badgers are still passing through and or using this area. Firstly, a word about the trail cams I am using.

GardePro - a no glow trail cam, which is proving very good both in speed and imagery. I had one a few years ago which expired rather quickly. I was rather nervous about getting another one. Early days yet, but it is still working. It's one really annoying feature: it's slider switch positions are different to all other trail cams.

The standard slider switch positions are Off-Set-Record.  GardePro's slider switch positions are Off-Record-Set. The number of times I have the GardePro to Set will make me a millionaire. 

Bargarbou. Recently bought. It is a 'low glow' camera. Animals can be spooked by the glow at night. Humans can see the glow, and the nefarious ones attempt to steal it. Otherwise, very cheap. Imagery and photography not bad. It's AVI videos can have difficulty playing back on Windows 11 ever since Microsoft released their mega update.

UsoGood. Again, recently bought. Very cheap. Problematic. Firstly, it is low glow, same as Bargarbou. Secondly, it's software will not turn on infrared lights in low light conditions or when another nearby trail cam switches its on. This results in grainy, dark images or none at all if a nearby trail cam switches its IR off. I have to deploy these trail cams away from others. Thirdly, can't really playback videos on Windows 11 as it's AVI codec is not recognised ever since Microsofts' mega update. YouTube, Openshot, etc do not recognise it either. Only VLC media player recognises it. So I use VLC to convert UsoGood's videos from AVI to mpeg. A complete pain. Otherwise, decent enough imagery.

We kick off with the arrival of badger one, crawling under a fence by the outlier sett. These sett has the UsoGood trail cam on it. Note the time.

The UsoGood has decided there is sufficient light for it to photograph and video without using IR.

15 minutes later, badger two arrives, performing some interesting gymnastics.

It kept inching lower...

And lower...

Before losing interest in the sett entrance.

The badgers then tend to hang around just to the right of the trail cam. Frustratingly, I haven't managed to place a trail cam pointing in that direction to see what they are doing. But from various sounds, they appear to be grooming.

Jumping around a bit. The badgers tend to arrive at this outlier sett when light starts fading (roughly 21:50 currently) and then head home just when light starts building up, roughly 4:00 am. Thus, I was very surprised to see this...

This is a slightly more normal return to home time, but still a bit late.

Conversely, one of the earliest times I've seen the badgers currently. Plus a bit of indecision.

It takes a trail cam up to three seconds from triggering to videoing. The badger was out and over to the right of the camera before it started videoing. However the badger hung around, grooming.

Then decides to go back under the fence.

Is this the same badger returning a few minutes later?

Has a good scratch.

Before disappearing back under the fence.