MUSTELID^. 487 



■weigh as mucli as thirty pounds. The head is white, with 

 a broad black stripe on each side widening out towards the 

 ears. The eyes are small, and the snout tapers somewhat to 

 a point. The very loose skin is clothed with short fur and 

 long greyish-brown hairs ; throat, under parts, inside of leg, 

 and feet black. The tail is short and bushy, yellowish-brown 

 in colour, and about six inches long. The badger lives in huge 

 burrows in the earth, with several openings, often twenty- 

 five or thirty yards apart ; these dwellings are made in the 

 thickest woods some way from man's habitations. They some- 

 times use fox's " earths " for their burrows, and live in 

 harmony with " Eeynard." They often stay in their burrows 

 for days at a time in winter, but do not actually hibernate. 

 There are usually two large chambers in the burrows, the 

 chamber in which the litter is found being lined with dry 

 grass and leaves. The badger is not, as is generally supposed, 

 a solitary animal, but where it is not disturbed it is social. 

 Charles St John counted seven together at one time on the 

 shores of Loch Ness.^ The badger closes the entrance to its 

 earth in winter when the weather is cold, but soon comes out 

 when the temperature gets warmer. The young are usually 

 four in number, being blind at birth and for nine days or so 

 after. The diet of the badger is very varied ; they take both 

 animal and vegetable food. Eoots of various kinds, nuts, 

 leaves, grass, fungi, snails, slugs, worms, insects and their 

 larvae, frogs, snakes, birds' eggs and young ground-birds, mice, 

 small rabbits, and even hedgehogs, are devoured by them. They 

 certainly do some damage to game, but in nowise interfere with 

 foxes, as is sometimes supposed. On the other hand, they 

 do good by destroying many vennin, and therefore should 

 not be destroyed, as has been too often the case in the past. 

 They are particularly fond of wasp -grubs, and destroy great 

 numbers of nests during the summer, a habit which alone 

 should atone for the slight loss they may occasion in game and 

 1 ' Wild Sports and Natural History of the Highlanda.' 



