My First Ever Badgers

11 July 2022 – It was 20:50pm, and Dad and I left the house to pick up my sister. As we had time before my sister’s arrival, we decided to drive into the Phoenix Park for some wildlife-watching, so we brought the camera and binoculars on the off-chance we’d see something. As we were leaving the house, I even suggested that we might see badgers, as this was around the time of day when we were most likely to spot them.

Upon driving into the park, we parked the car by the side of the road as we headed downhill towards a small patch of woodland, Dad with the camera and me with the binoculars. We had to traverse through a bunch of stinging nettles as we approached the fence separating us from the woods. We stood at the fence to get a better view of the forest, scanning the area to see if we could see anything, be it a fox, an owl or a hedgehog, but a badger would be the most exciting of all, as I had never seen one in the flesh. Ever.

After a few minutes standing up on the fence, I noticed something with long, white and yellowish fur hiding in the grass over at the clearing to our left. At first, I thought “Is that a fox or a dog?” I used the binoculars to closely inspect the creature, and it was neither of these. It was one of the usual fallow deer, along with its fawn and some other deer, as they grazed the grass in the clearing. I had spotted some deer grazing near the side of the road as we drove into the park just moments before, and we had originally considered visiting just to spot the deer, unless we came across something that we don’t often see.

Sure enough, as I observed the deer, Dad noticed something grey and furry along the grassy trail on our side of the fence. As he observed it, he accidentally pressed the automatic focus button on the camera. In response, the animal turned its head to face him, revealing an unmistakably white head with black stripes running over each eye down to its black nose…it was a badger!

The moment he whispered to me “Dave! Dave! Badger!”, my heart immediately started beating rapidly once I saw the animal. I knew that this was the first time for both of us that we had ever seen a badger, and I couldn’t help but keep my eyes fixed on the animal. I made sure to keep my voice down so as not to disturb it (and anything else nearby), while Dad tried his best to photograph it in these low-light conditions. For a while, the badger did not seem particularly disturbed by our presence, even while there was a man walking his dog nearby. It eventually slinked out of sight into the dense vegetation after hearing the autofocus on the camera, and remained invisible for roughly five minutes, during which time we kept our eyes peeled to see if it would make its reappearance. And sure enough, Dad spotted the badger again, but this time, it was on the other side of the fence, standing on a trail of short grass. Dad tried taking several photographs of the badger as it just stood, only moving its head to survey its surroundings and watch for danger.

As it stood there, I watched as something appeared from the grass to the badger’s right side (left from our points of view). It was another badger, which made the experience even more rewarding. The second badger seemed to sniff at the first one’s coat, presumably a friendly greeting or bond reinforcement. After two minutes, it ambled its way towards us and stopped underneath Dad as he filmed the animals with the camera. Suddenly, the second badger then scarpered downhill into the darkness of night, while I remained fairly close to it as it made its left turn. The first badger remained in its position for a minute before it too disappeared into the long grass by the fence.

We made our way along the fence to see if we could see the badger anymore as darkness continued to fall. In the process of doing so, one of the fallow deer gave a short, low-pitched bark before the herd ran off away from the forest after several minutes of grazing. Two years ago, we observed a herd of red deer in a forest in Wicklow, before one of them gave a startlingly loud, high-pitched bleat before the whole herd scarpered, so the fallow deer’s alarm call was much more subtle in comparison. We spotted the badger hiding behind some vegetation slightly further down. It then headed downhill away from us, but was still visible for a few seconds as we watched it vanish into the undergrowth.

It was just after 22:00pm and my sister must have arrived by then, so we slowly climbed down the fence, gave the wood one last inspection, and then headed back towards the car. Dad initially asked me if I would be happy to stay and see if the badgers would reappear, while he went to pick up my sister before coming back for me. However, we decided it was better if we left together. As we left the park, I examined the camera to see what photos and videos Dad had got of the badgers. Most of the photographs were very shaky and gave a poor view of the animal, except for the first one, which is fairly clear despite not being of the best quality. There were two videos of fairly decent quality (although still rather shaky at times), of which one features a closeup of the badger that came up close to Dad before shooting off into the forest.

In fairness, poor-quality photos of the badgers are better than no photos at all, and I knew that actually seeing the animals is the most important thing about the experience, especially since this was our first time seeing a living, breathing badger. This was definitely a day that neither me nor my dad will ever want to forget.