The “Redwall” book series I read as a kid might be my first awareness of badgers as a species. In the books, all the badger characters are fierce warriors with grumpy, independent personalities. Though the books are fantasy fiction based on English wildlife, American badgers have similar reputations. Sadly, I have yet to see a live badger, but if you’ve seen one around the valley, or sign of one, Home Range Wildlife Research wants to hear from you.
“Badgers are here — and they should be — but we don’t actually know much about what their deal is,” Anna Machowicz told me. Anna is the field programs director and co-founder of Home Range, the local wildlife research organization that is launching a pilot project in 2027 to study American badgers in Washington’s shrub-steppe habitat. The project will focus on Okanogan County.
“We know surprisingly little about where badgers occur across this landscape, and how best to survey for them,” said Anna, “so the goal of the pilot year is to test and compare several approaches for detecting them.”
Home Range Wildlife Research wants to know if you spot a badger in Okanogan County.
Fieldwork begins next spring, with trail cameras and detection dogs trained to find badger scat for genetic and diet analysis. Observation reports from community members play an important role in the study.
The team hopes to answer a lot of questions about badgers in our region: “Where are they? What are they eating? How common are they? What sizes are their home ranges? What habitats are they using, and how much of that habitat is left?”
Badgers are famous for their strength and tenacity. “With strong forelimbs, a good sense of smell, and a head full of determination, they are specialized for digging — and they do it well,” Anna said. “Not only do they sleep and raise their young in underground burrows, but they can dig many burrows each day while looking for their main source of prey that also lives underground — ground squirrels.”
The digging benefits more than just the badger. “Aside from their impressive digging abilities, they play an important ecological role,” said Anna. The soil excavated by badgers retains moisture, and ground disturbance can encourage the seeds of native plant species to grow and take hold.
Abandoned badger burrows become homes for insects, birds, and lizards. “In the shrub-steppe, burrowing owls are dependent on established underground burrows like that of the badger,” said Anna. Burrowing owls are of particular conservation concern in Washington, and another species I would love to see.
Every badger sighting, track, or burrow anywhere in Okanogan County is worth reporting, with as much detail as possible, at tinyurl.com/methowbadgers. If you see a badger, Anna emphasized, don’t approach it or interact with it. Nuisance and conflict encounters should be reported to Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife at WILDCOMM@dfw.wa.gov or (360) 902-2936.
“One of the best things about this project so far,” said Anna, “is all of the stories that come with reports of badger observations from the community, and we hope to “dig up” a lot more of these stories as the project gets underway.”
Home Range will give a talk about badgers on Feb. 12 of next year in Tonasket as part of the Highland Wonders speaker series. To learn more about the project, visit homerange.org, or email Anna Machowicz at anna@homerange.org.
