With their striking facial markings, badgers are easily recognisable. Also known as brocks, they are one of the UK's favourite mammals.

Life span
Up to 14 years.

Statistics
Head and body length: 65-80cm, Weight: 8-12kg.

Physical description
Eurasian badgers are easily recognisable by the conspicuous black and white stripes running from the nose to the shoulders. They are stocky animals with short black legs and silvery grey backs.

Distribution
Badgers range from Europe to Japan and S. China. In Britain, badgers are most abundant in south west England, Wales and small areas of north east England.

Habitat
They generally prefer forest and grassland.

Diet
Badgers feed on earthworms, frogs, rodents, birds, eggs, lizards, insects, bulbs, seeds and berries.

Behaviour
Eurasian badgers are nocturnal and emerge from their setts at dusk. They live in family groups, or clans, of up to 12 individuals, which occupy a shared territory of 125-375 acres. The boundaries of the territories are marked out with odour and defended.

Badgers inhabit underground burrows called setts which consist of several chambers, passages and entrances and are used by successive generations of badgers. Nesting material is often carried out of the sett in the day and aired in the sunshine.

They are gregarious and will indulge in playful romping, which helps to strengthen their social bonds.

Reproduction
Badgers exhibit a breeding phenomena known as delayed implantation, which means that they can breed at any time of the year. The purpose is to ensure that young are produced at a time when temperature and food conditions are at their optimum. After mating, they keep the fertilised eggs in the uterus in a state of suspended development until they are implanted in the uterine wall, usually after 10 months. After a further gestation period of 7-8 weeks, they give birth to a litter of 1-6 cubs.

Conservation status
Badgers are not considered endangered but numbers have been depleted. They are protected under various wildlife acts and UK law states that it is an offence to kill, injure or capture a badger, or to interfere with its sett.

It is estimated that 50,000 badgers meet their deaths in Britain through road traffic accidents every year. Badgers are hunted legally and illegally in many of the countries they inhabit.

The Department for Food, Environment and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) are in the process of carrying out a massive cull, killing 20,000 badgers (under licence), to establish whether they spread bovine TB in cattle.