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BA'DGER, s, a wild animal about the size of a fox, that lives in solitary places, feeds on fruits, and makes a desperate resistance when attacked by the dogs. (Complete and Universal English Dictionary, by the Rev James Barclay, 1815)







"The fangs of a bear and the tusks of a wild boar do not bite worse and make deeper gashes than a goose-quill sometimes, no, not even the badger himself, who is said to be so tenacious of his bite that he will not give over his hold til he feels his teeth meet and the bones crack." James Howell


It's October and starting to turn cold. The badgers are out and about, putting on weight for the coming winter. We have seen good activity in the concession and decided to see if we could get out and try to put our plans to take a big boar for the wall into action last night.

My son packed a CZ .223 and I a combination rifle in .22 and 16 bore and, dressed against the cold, we drove the short distance to the ground that we manage. My son dropped me a short walk from one of the high seats where we knew a decent sized badger was coming in to feed and he drove to another part of the concession to take up in a ground blind in some pines.

I had not been in the blind for 30 minutes when my iPhone buzzed.

"Badger's down! A big one too!"




He had seen the badger coming in amongst the pines and dropped him cleanly with a perfect shoulder shot with the .223 shooting 55 gr Sako softs. A big old boar weighing in at 14 kgs dressed! Now that's a big badger!







We were home and toasting the badger with cold beers by 10.00 pm with the badger cleaned and in the freezer to be sent off to the taxidermist for mounting!

One of the quickest hunts that I have ever experienced but then again when Diana smiles take what she gives you!!

And so that was the 2020 badger hunt! But maybe there will be a chance for another one before the end of the season being November 30th!






Charlie

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In Germany, badgers are a prized hunting trophy and some 50.000 are hunted annually. The Dachshund (Badger dog) was specifically bred for hunting badgers and smoked badger meat is considered a delicacy! In fact throughout Europe, badger was eaten in France (Blaieau au sang being the dish that called for badger), Croatia in goulash and in WWII badger was reportedly eaten in the UK. But care needs to be exercised if you do eat the badger that you shoot as they can carry trichinosis. The same goes for bear meat and wild boar. Interestingly the WHO reports 10.000 cases of trichinosis a year, with many of the cases being in the US.


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Charlie,
Now that's something different. Congratulations to your son! Thanks for posting the report. Enjoyable to read as always. How late did you start? Right after sunset or much later?

The first time I hunted in Sweden at night for boar, I was told that it would be OK to shoot a fox or a badger. Unfortunately, I never saw boar, fox or badger, which made for a rather boring evening. :-)

Cheers,
Jeff

Very nice! Congrats!

I learn something everyday:

1- Badgers and badger hunting in Europe.

2- People eat badgers

Congratulations on a successful hunt.

Hi Charlie:

Very nicely furred and colorful too.
Congrats to the boy. This will make
a fine looking mount.
Pelt? or body mount?

Hope you'll share a few pictures of it
once it's done.

This sure looks different from the one's
we have around here.

George

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George,

The European badger being the Melina is one of the four subspecies, the others being Helictidinae (which includes the ferret badger), the Mellivorinae (the honey badger in Africa) and Taxideinae (the American badger)!


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Will it be in bad form to observe that the badger looks too much like our Texas skunk for me to touch it after shooting it? Yes, I trapped and killed some skunks as a teenager and still kill all skunks that I encounter, but the thought of eating one never entered my mind!
I hope that I am never that hungry. Last night my wife prepared Pronghorn backstrap and it was outstanding! As long as I can keep the freezers filled with deer, pronghorn, elk, birds, and edible tasty exotics, NO SKUNKS for me.

I have called a couple of our badgers in here in Texas. I saw one at my friend's place headed out to pig hunt the other night. Never got a shot on any of them. We trapped a few when coons were worth something. Never thought about eating one. You can eat about anything, remember "hunger makes the sauce"! Nice kill!

In most of Europe badger cannot be sold as edible meat, being often severely infested by parasites.
At the opposite, in France it is legal to sell badger "delicacies" like "badger ham".

Just got one last week in Czech Republic
Big male and it’s getting stuffed for living room
Heading back to states for whitetail rut

In Sweden they train carnivore dogs on badgers as they also hunt bear, lynx with them but not hooved game.