Taxidea taxus

During my last point count on Thursday, I had a chance meeting with an elusive and beautiful mammal: an American Badger, Taxidea taxus. I have only ever seen two badgers in real life: once, at dusk, when I was seven or eight, I saw one scuttling away into the tall grass in an open field; and once I had one run across the road in front of my car at night, just on the edge of the headlights. Needless to say, I have really only seen their butts. But this time, it was broad daylight, about 7:30am, and I was hiking to my 6th point of the day in the Jeffrey Pine forest south of Mono Lake. There had been a burn here a while back and I was weaving through bitterbrush and  downed trees that were in the beginning stages of returning to the earth as mulch. I saw movement along a fallen log and stopped to investigate.

It trundled along, low to the ground, it's wide and flat body seeming to rock and glide at the same time. When it saw me and looked up, I realized what it was. My jaw dropped. It stared at me and I stared right back (through my binoculars). I was only 25 meters away, but it stayed calm (calmer than me, I suppose, because I was shocked and thrilled at the beauty of this animal) and eyed me curiously for about a minute before it turned as if to leave, turned back as if it might still be interested, and then trundled off again and into it's burrow beneath a giant decomposing Jeffrey pine.

I stood there for a second and then said out loud, to no one in particular "That was a badger! I just saw a badger! Whoa!". I had never expected to get that great a look at one out here, or ever really! I often forget that badgers exist because they are nocturnal and are rarely seen even though they live in the western two thirds of the U.S. They are no feisty raccoon or bold opossum--badgers tend to be shy though fierce when provoked. The eat small mammals and occasionally reptiles and birds, using their long sharp claws to dig other small burrowing animals out of their dens or hiding places. Badgers are in the Mustelid family, which means they are related to weasels, martens, otters, and wolverines, among others.

I feel very lucky to have encountered this phantom creature in the wild. As a child, I loved the book "Bread and Jam for Frances" by Russel Hoban about a young badger who does not want to eat soft-boiled eggs for breakfast like everyone else; she prefers bread and jam. She sings cute little songs to her eggs or about her bread and jam. I highly recommend the book, or any of the books about Frances the badger and her family.