The curious case of a badger funeral

I KNOW it’s a bad habit, but I enjoy eavesdropping.

I was sitting in a dark corner of a country pub having a quiet pint and listening to a group of men at the bar.

One expert was assuring the others that when a badger was killed on the road the other badgers that lived in the sett took the body away and buried it.

It’s a charming idea — a badger funeral. And, though I have seen dead badgers lying at the verge of a road for several days, they do eventually disappear.

What happens to them is a bit of a mystery. I’m interested in badgers and I’ve spent a lifetime reading anything I can get my hands on about them, but I’ve never heard of them burying their dead.

One thing they certainly do is dig latrine pits. I’ve often come across these in the woods. Perhaps it’s this habit that gave rise to the belief they also dig graves.

Badgers are natur-ally clean and change their bedding regularly. They seem conscious of the need to avoid a build-up of parasites in the sett. This is why older setts are so large. They’re regularly extended by digging fresh bed chambers with no fleas in them.

A couple of weeks ago I wrote about greenfinches in this column. I mentioned that their numbers had been badly affected by an outbreak of trichomoniasis. I also mentioned I had seen a small increase in the numbers of greenfinches on my bird feeders this winter.

In fact, since I wrote that, there has been a further increase and I’ve seen two males and two females on the peanut feeder at the same time. I was curious about whether this small increase indicated the disease had run its course.

I asked readers if they’d noticed a recent increase in greenfinch numbers. I got a good response (apologies to those who have not yet got an acknowledgement).

There were reports from the west, south, east and Midlands. Each reader had noticed a decline in greenfinch numbers in recent years and about half of them believed there had been a small comeback this winter.

One Dublin reader reported such detailed and knowledgeable observations that I will quote part of his email: “I had good numbers of greenfinches at my feeders up to the winter of 2009 and birds continued in good numbers as the breeding season of 2010 unfolded. Then disaster struck… I had not seen any birds with trichomoniasis up to then, though I had heard of birds being badly affected in the UK.

“But in August and September of 2010 almost all the juvenile greenfinches, and a smaller proportion of adults, coming to my feeders were sick or dying.

On reading about it I could see that they had contracted trichomoniasis. I also saw a dunnock die from the disease, as well as a feral pigeon. All other birds, including thrushes, sparrows, tits and other finches, seemed uninfected.

“During the cold winter of 2010/2011 greenfinch numbers were well down on the previous year… The winter of 2011/2012 was exceptionally (and scarily) mild. Greenfinch numbers were up a little on the previous winter, but still very low. However, none were sick and I got the impression that things were improving.

“This feeling was reinforced over the past two weeks as greenfinches started singing, reminding me of those glory days when they seemed to be singing all spring and summer long around here, if singing is the right word for their squawling sound. So, yeah, I think numbers are up, alright.”

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