what to feed badgers

What can I feed badgers?

• Fruit - grapes, apples, pears, plums
• Raw peanuts or brazil nuts (no salt or chocolate)
• Dried dog food (muesli type)
• Mealworms
• Peanut butter (unsalted, sugar-free)

Full Answer

How do you treat a badger that won't eat?

Use wet cat or dog food, or specialist badger food. Provide some fruits, such as apples, plums or pears, and nuts, such as unsalted peanuts or brazils. Leave out root vegetables like carrots, along with some cooked potato. If food isn’t eaten overnight, remove anything that will go off and replace it with fresh offerings in the evening.

What do you feed a badger with a sore throat?

Use wet cat or dog food, or specialist badger food. Provide some fruits, such as apples, plums or pears, and nuts, such as unsalted peanuts or brazils. Leave out root vegetables like carrots, along with some cooked potato.

What do badgers eat in your yard?

Badgers love fruits including pears, apples, elderberries, and plums. You will often find these creatures lurking around people’s gardens. They also eat acorns, seeds, and nuts together with crops such as sweet corn and wheat.

How much do you feed a badger?

In terms of quantities, feed no more than the equivalent of a large handful of peanuts or dried food, plus the same amount of soft wet food (such as grapes) per visiting badger. Badger setts are often found in broadleaved woods, but they can be found wherever where there are lots of earthworms.

What is the badgers Favourite food?

earthwormsWhat do badgers eat? The staple food of badgers is usually earthworms which generally make up around 80% of their diet. They can eat several hundred worms each night. But being omnivorous, they will eat almost anything, from flesh and fruit to bulbs and birds' eggs.

Is it safe to feed badgers?

The Badger Trust does not recommend feeding badgers. You may enjoy attracting badgers but this could be problematic for others in your neighbourhood. If you feel like you must feed them in severe weather, when natural resources are in question, a small handful of peanuts will suffice.

Should badgers eat bread?

If you wish to feed badgers in your garden, they will readily eat peanuts, raisins, most soft fruits and bread (which can be soaked in water or spread with peanut butter).

Do badgers like carrots?

Lots of earthworms, in fact – badgers can eat several hundred in a night. They also eat fruit, birds' eggs and occasionally even small mammals. They dig holes in lawns to root out worms and in beds to get at bulbs, and they'll happily steal carrots and sweetcorn from vegetable plots.

Is it good to have badgers in your garden?

It may not seem like it, but badgers are very beneficial to the environment in more than one way. So, why do they matter[i]? As badgers go about their habitual practices, they disperse seeds. This helps plants to spread and grow.

Do badgers eat cooked rice?

If you want to give the badgers dog-food or cat-food, start with a value brand and see how the badgers like it. If you have young badger cubs who visit, small pieces of plain food are OK - for example - plain moist soft-boiled rice, wet kitten food or puppy food.

Do badgers eat vegetables?

A Badgers are omnivorous, eating a wide range of animal and vegetable foods. Their most important food is the earthworm, but they also eat bulbs (though not bluebells) and small mammals including young rabbits.

Do badgers eat bird seed?

As a nation we are very fond of our wildlife and having badgers visit your garden can be very exciting. They are often attracted by bird seed but also if you have a lawn badgers will be keen to eat the grubs which live in it.

Do badgers eat strawberries?

Accordingly, badgers will tend to eat all manner of free Autumn food - including: berries (like elder berries, strawberries, blackberries and even yew berries)

Do badgers eat apples?

Feeding badgers: Provide some fruits, such as apples, plums or pears, and nuts, such as unsalted peanuts or brazils. Leave out root vegetables like carrots, along with some cooked potato. If food isn't eaten overnight, remove anything that will go off and replace it with fresh offerings in the evening.

Can badgers eat grapes?

They will also eat seedless grapes, apples, pears, plums, plain peanuts or brazil nuts (no salt or chocolate), peanut butter sandwiches, a very few Sugar Puffs or Custard Cream biscuits.

Do badgers eat honey?

Honey badgers are omnivores that reptiles, small mammals, frogs, honey, bee larvae, and more. Honey badgers eat honey, bee larvae, insects, amphibians, reptiles, small mammals, berries, roots, and more.

What to do if you can't eat overnight?

If food isn’t eaten overnight, remove anything that will go off and replace it with fresh offerings in the evening.

What to do if food isn't eaten overnight?

If food isn’t eaten overnight, remove anything that will go off and replace it with fresh offerings in the evening. Research suggests that unpredictable supplementary feeding is beneficial e.g. moving the feeding spots around and scattering food in a more natural way. Avoid any interaction between dogs and hedgehogs.

What to feed a hedgehog?

Feeding hedgehogs: Use plain kitten biscuits or a specialist hedgehog food (sold in garden centres), which helps to keep their teeth sharp and clean. If you have a problem with cats eating the food, try placing the food under a brick shelter with a hedgehog-sized gap in it.

Do wild mammals have visitors?

Most wild mammals are nocturnal and secretive so you may not know you have any visitors. Whether you have an urban garden or you live in the countryside, hedgehogs, wood mice and even badgers often visit. You might be surprised at who makes an appearance! Constantly putting out food can make wild mammals reliant on unnatural food sources.

What is the toughest animal in the world?

Badgers are some of the toughest creatures in existence. These short-legged creatures are omnivores in the Mustelidae family. There are 11 different species of badger and all of them are identified by their squat body. The four main groups of badger include the European badger, the ferret badger, the honey badger or ratel and the American badger.

Why do badgers have a mouth?

The badger’s mouth is also ideal for making twisting movements so they can attack creatures or access hard to reach foods with ease. These species can consume a huge variety of food types but they do show preference to some food sources like the following;

What is a badger's hide?

The badger has a tough hide that protects it from predators. Their short legs are ideal for digging out creatures from underground and their long heads and small ears allow them to fit into tiny holes so they can extract food. Badgers can also consume very tough food types.

Why is it important not to overfeed a badger?

Animals that struggle through times of great need such as drought are often dehydrated and malnourished. If you do happen to find a malnourished badger then it is important not to overfeed. It is critical to introduce foods to starving animals at a very slow rate.

How many cubs can a badger have?

These cubs are usually born only once a year and every mother can have a litter of 1 – 5 cubs.

What are the different types of badgers?

The four main groups of badger include the European badger, the ferret badger, the honey badger or ratel and the American badger. The badger species may look different and some do have behavior variations but they all do shelter underground in burrows called setts and all of them are omnivorous creatures with a very versatile diet.

Can honey badgers attack cats?

If food is scarce, species like the honey badger will attack cats. They are not shy at all to consume creatures far more dangerous than cats. It is unlikely for badgers to simply catch a cat. Cats are much quicker and more agile than short and stout badgers.

What are badgers?

Badgers, from the family Mustelidae, are short-legged, omnivorous mammals. They include otters, polecats, wolverines, and weasels. Badgers belong to Canoidea or Caniformia, a suborder of carnivorous mammals.

Where Do Badgers Find Their Food?

Badgers can look for food anywhere – usually along the countryside and people’s gardens where there is rich vegetation. Badgers will also take advantage of animal meat and carcasses if they’re available. They also raid garbage bins for food scraps.

Do Badgers Eat Hedgehogs?

In the UK, the main predators of hedgehogs are badgers. Since badgers have long claws and thick skin, they are among the many species of animals that can prey on and consume the defensive hedgehogs. If you noticed hedgehogs lurking around your area, then avoid attracting foxes or badgers until the young ones have matured.

What Can I Feed Badgers With?

If there are badgers in your garden, it is because of the food source available in your garden. However, some gardeners may react differently to their presence. Some people think they’re a nuisance because they can mess up a garden by digging up plants, eating vegetables and fruits, and ruining the plot to look for grubs and worms.

How To Feed Badgers

Pile a heap of food on your porch to lure the badgers. Their scavenging and eating habits allow them to sniff out, find and consume food. You can also scatter food all over your lawn or garden.

How Much Should I Feed Them?

Be careful when feeding wild mammals. Do it in such a way that they will not rely on the readily available food source. Feeding a variety of foods irregularly and in small amounts or as a rare treat is recommended, especially during spring and winter.

Can badgers bite you?

If you want to attempt to civilise them (by providing a bowl), then use one of more METAL dog- type bowls, which are difficult to tip over (e.g. one for water and one for food). Badgers may be very rough with bowls - for example, biting them, kicking them, clawing at them and even using them in tug-of-war fights, and CERAMIC OR GLASS BOWLS WILL GET BROKEN eventually.

Do badgers rely on food?

Wildlife species - including badgers will come to rely on food handouts; so you should be careful to plan your feeding regime in advance. Make sure if you feed large amounts that you can always do this, so you will need to be sure of reliable holiday "cover" for when you are away.

Benefits of Feeding Badgers

Badgers have different strategies and behaviors depending on their environment. It makes sense for them to take advantage of any food offered in an urban setting, whether that it via trash or food deliberately left out.

Downsides of Feeding Badgers

While there isn’t a risk to your cats and dogs, who can easily come inside and give the badger some space, there may be a problem in encouraging badgers if you have other animals. Smaller animals that live in runs or hutches outside could be seen as easy prey given the badger’s love of large rodents.

What Do Badgers Eat?

Badgers have impressive diets and will take advantage of what they can get. Our badgers shouldn’t need supplemental feeding unless times are really tight. But, they will still be grateful for anything offered.

What to Feed Badgers

If you have a secure environment and the space for badgers and want to help the local population out, you need to know what to feed them. The badger’s carnivorous diet in the wild means that you need to replicate this with plenty of meat. The best way to do this is to get real fresh meat and leave it out in a bowl.

Why do badgers need water?

Water is especially important in hot periods; as many badger cubs die of dehydration if they can't get enough wet food to drink. Providing fresh clean water in the summer is a great benefit for badgers and other species; and we would encourage gardeners to do this if they can.

Why are there hungry badgers in my garden?

Hungry Badgers in Your Garden. Badgers are increasingly having to adapt to urban life, due to pressure on our Countryside. They may occasionally be a minor nuisance by eating fruit, flower bulbs or root vegetables, or by making shallow pits in lawns when searching for insect grubs or earthworms .

How to help badgers?

You can help badgers by providing a bowl of water and occasionally a little wet or sloppy cat food or dog food, as badgers will come out of their setts to feed during the evenings.

Do badgers eat takeaway food?

If a badger clan lives near a takeway; it is more likely that members will be familiar with the normal takeaway food; and be happy to eat it. Badgers which lives in a rural area may not have come across takeaway food waste; so they may be reluctant to eat it, if other food sources are to hand.

Do badgers eat rabbits?

Apart from a minor nuisance, remember that badgers also eat garden insect pests, and other small mammals (especially vermin species like mice, rats and rabbits) as well as clearing up any small animal carcases/carrion so are not 100% bad in gardens.

Can hedgehogs eat cows milk?

Some people wish to feed a variety or nocturnal visitors to their gardens - including Hedgehogs , Foxes and badgers, and wonder what to do for the best. Hedgehogs are daft enough to eat soggy bread in cows milk BUT IT IS NOT GOOD FOR THEM (as dairy products can damage their digestive system).

Can you wash a dog food bowl with hot water?

If you wish to use a feeding bowl (!), then use a heavy metal dog-food bowl; and wash it in very hot water with a good detergent. Do not use the same wash water, dishcloths or tea towels for animal-dishes and human-dishes.

How do badgers affect grass?

The most common effects from badgers in the landscape are sections of dug up grass. The animals are simply looking for larvae, a favorite food, and scrape away the sod with their heavy claws. In healthy lawns, this damage is not permanently harmful and the sod will recover in time. Digging usually occurs in spring when larvae are present.

How to prevent digging in lawns?

To prevent digging in lawns where they habitually feed, apply some wire mesh over the area in spring when digging activity is most acute. Non-toxic methods, such as noise deterrents and sonic devices, have limited control since the animals get used to the annoying sensations.

How to keep badgers away from my house?

Keeping badgers away may require special fencing, ceasing feeding other animals and natural insect control. Badgers build setts, which are complex burrows where they live and raise young. They rarely do this in close contact to humans but, sometimes, a badger family may take up residence in a home garden. The most common effects from badgers in the ...

When do badgers dig?

Digging usually occurs in spring when larvae are present . Badgers are very determined animals and may damage fences and barriers in their forage for food. They also mark their territory by digging “latrines,” trenches marked with urine and feces to discourage other badgers and animals.

Do badgers damage gardens?

They are a protected species in the United Kingdom but laws are more flexible in the United States. Badgers in the garden tend to dig up law ns to find insects and, occasionally, flower beds to eat bulbs or vegetable beds when other food is scarce.

Is badger damage permanent?

Printer Friendly Version. Image by edevansuk. Badger damage can be annoying and visually distressing but rarely causes permanent effects. Their behavior is habitual and seasonal and generally badgers in the garden are not a problem during winter and fall. If badger damage is bad enough you feel you need to take steps learn how to get rid ...

Can you use insecticide on a garden?

Because this is a very determined animal with very set habits and tenacity, repelling them from your garden can be challenging. Removing insects by the use of insecticides or larvicides is not recommended, as these are not the only food the animal seeks and such use can actually kill beneficial insects.