Thomas Gray: Guest Post
Through a series of guest posts, I am exploring Nature Connection and how different people experience and connect with the natural world.
In this post, keen badger watcher and author of Badgers in a Time of Corona , Thomas Gray (age 14), explains how he first became enthralled by Britain’s most elusive mammal.
One of the many photos in his book, Badgers in a Time of Corona
I can remember the first time I saw a wild badger on its own terms. Me and around ten of my other classmates, were looking through the wildlife hide’s window, hoping for a glimpse of some nocturnal life. I was at the Stubbington Study Centre, and with nothing for half an hour, it was rewarding to finally see a black and white snout hover above a thick layer of brambles that coated the woodland floor.
That tiny moment I can still vividly remember to this day, but it was long after that when I experienced it again. When I got home, I was very eager to find badgers locally, confident that I would, for research told me that hilly and deciduously wooded areas are almost perfect for the species. This was plentiful in rural Hampshire. I have to say though, that it didn’t immediately go as planned, for aside to setts (term for a badgers’ burrow), rabbit warrens were also very abundant.
It must have been after perhaps fifteen unsuccessful watches when I realised that it was practically implausible for a badger to fit down a hole with the diameter of a cricket ball. Feeling slightly embarrassed, I started looking a little harder, seeking out slopes facing south/southwest, and accessible places away from human disturbance. After a few days, that managed to slip to weeks, I eventually came to a clearing under a canopy of thick beeches, where loose chalk was sprawled out everywhere.
One of Tom’s fantastic illustrations from his book, Badgers in a Time of Corona
Fast forward four years, and I saw my first badger in daylight once more. It was then I realised how lucky I was to have seen that. People who have badgers living literally under their noses hardly ever see them; there are around 490,000 individuals living in the UK, but are all extremely enigmatic. You see, they are nervous creatures, shy ones, ones that only emerge from the underground blackness because they have to. Being with them completely in the wild, gives me a sense of satisfaction, not just because seeing their faces is thrilling, but because I have eluded them.
Because they are mainly nocturnal, some may argue crepuscular in the summer, badgers have little use of their eyes, but compensate for that with their acute hearing, and incredibly sense of smell, which is 850 times more sharper than yours or mine. Again, knowing this makes me realise I have evaded some of the very important traits that make them mammals, so I can enjoy their presence even more.
The majority of the entries in my book, Badgers in a Time of Corona involves them, and if you read it, you’ll find that I get more knowledgeable of where they’ll emerge next, I pick out more interesting watching positions, and I get to know the different characters etc. etc. In short, what I am trying to get across, is that we can get heaps out of British fauna if we put our minds to it. The badger is (I would say), a very hard animal to get close to – their senses will justify that if the wind is wrong, but it is not impossible. Definitely not.
I’ve heard people talk about how boring the wildlife living with us is. I disagree entirely, in fact, badgers look like some exotic creature from South America! While writing my book, I wanted people like that to see my opinion, to get out there and give it a try, whether it’s the house fly or the red deer, but also, for the people who are just getting started, to keep going with it.
Because if you do, you will be rewarded.
Thomas Gray, 2021
You can buy Tom’s book, Badgers in a Time of Corona on Amazon
You can watch Thomas’ wonderful video and interview with Chris Packham and Megan McCubbin on SIBCLive below.
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