WEBVTT - How Do Badgers Work? 0:00:01.920 --> 0:00:04.320 Welcome to brain Stuff, a production of I Heart Radio, 0:00:06.240 --> 0:00:10.960 Hey brain Stuff, Lauren Bogabam. Here. The badgers of popular 0:00:11.000 --> 0:00:15.000 culture range quite a bit, from the dependable, no nonsense 0:00:15.080 --> 0:00:18.119 badger of Wind and the Willows to the friendly and 0:00:18.200 --> 0:00:22.880 faithful mascot of Hogwarts House Hufflepuff, to other sports mascots, 0:00:22.960 --> 0:00:26.639 to dancing flash animations to the shall we say care 0:00:26.720 --> 0:00:31.600 free honey badger of internet lore. As a group of animals, 0:00:31.760 --> 0:00:35.720 badgers are equally varied. The name doesn't refer to one 0:00:35.800 --> 0:00:39.920 specific animal. From an evolutionary standpoint, the badgers of the 0:00:39.920 --> 0:00:44.440 world represent four separate evolutionary lineages within the weasel family 0:00:44.720 --> 0:00:49.640 must Talladay, which also includes ferrets, otters, and wolverines, plus 0:00:49.680 --> 0:00:53.400 a fit lineage represented by the two species of stink badgers, 0:00:53.760 --> 0:00:56.560 which aren't even classified as weasels at all, but belong 0:00:56.640 --> 0:01:00.960 to the skunk family. A fitted day, we spoke Emily Latch, 0:01:01.000 --> 0:01:04.200 a wildlife geneticist in the Department of Biological Sciences at 0:01:04.200 --> 0:01:08.800 the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee. She said badgers are found 0:01:08.920 --> 0:01:13.160 nearly worldwide, living in diverse habitats and with diverse diets. 0:01:13.720 --> 0:01:17.000 One of their most unique features is their shared adaptations 0:01:17.120 --> 0:01:22.080 for fossa reality. Living underground, they have reduced eyes and ears, 0:01:22.480 --> 0:01:25.880 enlarged fore limbs and claws for digging, and bodies that 0:01:25.920 --> 0:01:30.520 are tapered at both ends. The American badger is a 0:01:30.520 --> 0:01:34.560 good example of these adaptations. American badgers are mostly nocturnal, 0:01:34.720 --> 0:01:38.480 mid sized carnivores that feed primarily on rodents, but also 0:01:38.600 --> 0:01:40.959 things that hang out on the ground, like snakes and 0:01:41.080 --> 0:01:45.080 ground dwelling birds. While they're found primarily in grasslands and 0:01:45.200 --> 0:01:48.600 other treeless areas, they can hang out in forests too. 0:01:49.200 --> 0:01:53.440 Unlike raccoons, coyotes, and white tailed deer, they're not thrilled 0:01:53.480 --> 0:01:56.360 by the presence of humans and the roads and houses 0:01:56.360 --> 0:01:58.880 and Verizon stores that come with us everywhere we go, 0:01:59.560 --> 0:02:02.000 but since there's not much of an option these days, 0:02:02.280 --> 0:02:06.160 they grudgingly tolerate suburban neighborhoods as long as there's plenty 0:02:06.160 --> 0:02:11.080 of soil to dig around in. Latch said, American badgers 0:02:11.120 --> 0:02:15.000 have few predators. Eagles and large carnivores such as wolves 0:02:15.000 --> 0:02:19.239 and bears might occasionally kill a small badger, but mustelids 0:02:19.280 --> 0:02:22.280 in general have a reputation for punching above their weight. 0:02:22.880 --> 0:02:25.640 As for badgers, some species such as the American badger 0:02:25.800 --> 0:02:28.560 or the honey badger have a well deserved reputation for 0:02:28.639 --> 0:02:33.480 being aggressive. By the way, the verb badger, meaning to 0:02:33.680 --> 0:02:38.240 persistently pester, actually doesn't come from the behavior of these animals, 0:02:38.280 --> 0:02:41.920 but rather the behavior of dogs trained to bother badgers 0:02:42.040 --> 0:02:48.000 during a fairly cruel medieval sport called badger baiting. One 0:02:48.080 --> 0:02:51.080 thing that unites badgers from all the world over, from 0:02:51.120 --> 0:02:54.760 North America to Africa to Southeast Asia is their habit 0:02:54.880 --> 0:02:58.880 of digging and living in dens called sets, which consists 0:02:58.919 --> 0:03:02.959 of an interconnected work of tunnels and chambers, and badgers 0:03:03.000 --> 0:03:05.639 lived together in groups, the size of the group depending 0:03:05.639 --> 0:03:09.040 on the size of the set. One European badger set 0:03:09.080 --> 0:03:11.880 in southern England is thought to cover a territory of 0:03:11.919 --> 0:03:15.160 over a square mile that's two thousand square meters, with 0:03:15.280 --> 0:03:18.360 up to a hundred entrances. It provides shelter for not 0:03:18.400 --> 0:03:22.720 only dozens of badgers, but rabbits and foxes too. Badgers 0:03:22.720 --> 0:03:25.440 sleep and give birth in specified chambers of the tunnel 0:03:25.480 --> 0:03:29.600 system and keep these burrows immaculately clean. They don't bring 0:03:29.680 --> 0:03:34.040 food in or eliminate waste inside. Sets can also house 0:03:34.160 --> 0:03:37.240 many generations of badgers, some have been found to be 0:03:37.320 --> 0:03:41.720 over a hundred years old. Badgers are such prolific and 0:03:41.800 --> 0:03:46.360 proficient diggers that they sometimes excavate ancient human artifacts and remains, 0:03:46.600 --> 0:03:50.360 albeit in a more haphazard manner than your standard archaeologist. 0:03:51.040 --> 0:03:55.280 For instance, in a European badger uncovered a two thousand 0:03:55.400 --> 0:03:58.560 year old burial urn near the side of Stonehenge which 0:03:58.560 --> 0:04:02.120 contained cremated remains and archer's wrist guard, a copper chisel, 0:04:02.280 --> 0:04:07.120 and a bronze saw. Similarly, in Alberta, Canada, in a 0:04:07.160 --> 0:04:10.080 farmer found a human skull sticking out of an American 0:04:10.080 --> 0:04:13.080 badger hole in his cow pasture. It turns out the 0:04:13.120 --> 0:04:16.440 skull belonged to an indigenous girl from the early eighteen hundreds, 0:04:16.560 --> 0:04:20.679 a time before Europeans arrived in the area. Also found 0:04:20.680 --> 0:04:24.160 in the badger's discard pile where many beads, brass, buttons, 0:04:24.160 --> 0:04:27.000 and rings that would have been very valuable at the time, 0:04:27.440 --> 0:04:30.359 suggesting that this was a personal stature who was probably 0:04:30.400 --> 0:04:35.680 on route between places. One of the most heartwarming and 0:04:35.920 --> 0:04:39.320 mystifying aspects of the American badger's social life is that 0:04:39.360 --> 0:04:43.640 they often prefer to hunt alongside coyotes, even passing up 0:04:43.680 --> 0:04:46.000 a hunting buddy of the same species to form a 0:04:46.040 --> 0:04:50.200 short term hunting alliance with one of these canines. Scientists 0:04:50.240 --> 0:04:54.080 believe that this unlikely partnership is convenient to both species 0:04:54.400 --> 0:04:58.440 because they're hunting techniques are so compatible. The badger can 0:04:58.480 --> 0:05:01.480 dig into a rodent's den and flush it out, only 0:05:01.520 --> 0:05:03.520 for the roadent to be chased and caught by the 0:05:03.560 --> 0:05:08.680 speedy coyote. Conversely, a coyote can chase the prey down underground, 0:05:08.839 --> 0:05:13.240 only to be cornered by the ruthless badger. Badger's employ 0:05:13.400 --> 0:05:17.320 a mix of vocalizations snarling, hisses, squeals, and growls to 0:05:17.480 --> 0:05:20.720 scare off attackers, but they also released a stinky must 0:05:20.760 --> 0:05:29.280 be smell if repellent sounds don't do the trick. Today's 0:05:29.279 --> 0:05:32.080 episode was written by Jescelyn Shields and produced by Tyler Clang. 0:05:32.480 --> 0:05:34.920 For more on this lots of other dependable topics, visit 0:05:34.960 --> 0:05:37.599 how stuff works dot com. Brain Stuff is production of 0:05:37.600 --> 0:05:40.039 I Heart Radio or more podcasts to my heart Radio 0:05:40.200 --> 0:05:42.839 visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever 0:05:42.839 --> 0:05:44.240 you listen to your favorite shows.