Mr & Mrs Brock at Home

Secret lives of badgers revealed
BBCNews.com

The subterranean secrets of badgers have been revealed by a BBC film crew.

Over two years, tiny cameras placed deep underground recorded the comings and goings of a wild badger family.

While the animals have been well studied outside of their setts, until now, little has been known about their behaviour while underground.

Never-before-seen behaviour was filmed, including the badgers diligently making their beds each evening before leaving the setts for a night of foraging.

The crew also captured newborn cubs on camera, as well as grooming and fighting between the older animals.

They did it for meerkats, and now they've done it for badgers -- reality TV for the wildlife set, only much more "real" than "reality" TV ever gets for hoomans. Face it, when you know you're being observed, you can't help but act differently. Even us dogs ham it up for the camera, because we know there's a hooman behind it, watching us.

But these BBC filmers seem to have pulled off the difficult task of creating a candid diary of two years in the life of a badger family, and considerin' that badgers don't much care for hoomans, it's safe to say the badgers didn't know they were being recorded live.

The tap dance routine wif the canes and hats was purely spontaneous and natural to the species. (grin)