A badger sett is never quite the same two months running. One visit you find fresh spoil heaps the colour of ginger cake and a trail of muddy prints leading off under the hawthorn; the next, the entrances are quiet and the grass has started to close over. That slow drift of change is exactly what monthly monitoring catches, and it is one of the most valuable things a volunteer can do for a local badger population. Below is a checklist you can print off, fold into a rucksack pocket and fill in with cold hands on a February evening.
Consistency beats frequency. A sett walked on the same week of every month, by the same route and in the same order, will tell you far more than sporadic visits made whenever someone is free. Dusk is the classic time — badgers emerge, birds settle, and torchlight is less conspicuous — but early morning works well too and suits people who would rather not walk back in the dark.
Record the date, the time you started and finished, the weather, and the state of the ground. Wet soil shows prints beautifully; a week of hard frost shows almost nothing. Without those notes, a blank result is impossible to interpret later. Go in pairs if you can, tell someone your route, and keep to public rights of way and footpaths unless you have permission from the landowner.
Walk a fixed transect: the same starting point, the same direction, the same finishing point. Count every entrance and note how many look active. An active entrance usually shows at least two of the following:
Note snuffle holes too — small conical digs in grassland where badgers have been hunting earthworms. They often appear several metres away from the sett and are a useful sign of foraging activity even when the entrances are quiet.
Most of what you record will be ordinary. The important exceptions are the ones to flag. Look for netting, blocked or part-filled entrances, spades or digging tools left nearby, snares, tyre tracks from vehicles that should not be there, lamping, fly-tipping, or machinery working close to the sett. Unusual digging beside a sett entrance, sacks of soil, or a sudden drop in the number of open holes all deserve a note and a follow-up.
Do not approach, photograph up close or move anything. Withdraw quietly, leave the site as you found it, and report what you saw to your local badger group and to the police wildlife crime officer. Badgers and their setts are protected in the UK, and the relevant statutory body — Natural England, Natural Resources Wales, NatureScot or the Northern Ireland Environment Agency — can advise on licensing and on what counts as an offence. If anything looks like deliberate interference, treat it as a matter for the police rather than something to investigate yourself.
Write down what you saw, where you stood and what time it was. A short, precise note made on the spot is worth more than a detailed account reconstructed the following week.
Setts are affected by what happens above and around them. Hedge flailing, scrub clearance, ditch digging, new fencing, drains, footpath widening, tree felling, housing or road works within a hundred metres or so all belong in your notes, along with natural events such as flooding of low entrances, drought hardening the soil, or snow revealing a network of tracks. Other wildlife is useful context: fox activity, rabbits, the arrival of a new pheasant pen, or a change in grazing pressure from cattle or sheep.
Print this once and copy it for each visit, or set it up as a spreadsheet with a row per month.
Activity drops and setts can look deserted. Snow is your best ally — follow tracks without leaving the path. Watch for flooding after heavy rain; a sett that takes on water may be abandoned or re-dug nearby.
Cubs are born in late winter and emerge in spring, so activity climbs sharply. There may be fresh digging as the clan enlarges the sett, and more visible bedding collection.
Peak activity and the best conditions for recording prints in dry soil after rain. Road casualties rise, and field operations such as silage cutting and hedge trimming can bring disturbance close to a sett.
Badgers gather bedding in earnest and young animals may disperse, so new holes can appear at satellite setts. Hedge flailing and ditch clearance are common now — note the dates and how close machinery came.
Keep the format the same, month after month. However dull a visit feels, a run of consistent blank records is still evidence of a stable sett, and that is exactly what you need when someone proposes a development, a new fence line or a change of land use nearby. Enter your notes into a spreadsheet as soon as you get home, and share the accumulated records with your local badger group, your county records centre or the landowner — whoever can act on them.
Flag anything urgent straight away rather than at the end of the year, because the first few days often matter most. Finally, look after yourself: never enter a sett, avoid unstable ground and steep spoil slopes, check for ticks, carry water, and let someone know when you expect to be back. If you are monitoring as part of a group, check that your insurance and any landowner permission cover the site before your first visit.
Photo: Robert MacRae / Pexels
