HELP NEEDED! Laser measurement of badgers

[hiroo onoda]

Last night whilst speed gunning badgers in my local wood I recordeded the following velocities:
+/- 1Kph to +/- 3Kph with an average of +/- 1.45Kph. Fairly normal. One result stood out however.

Has anyone else clocked a badger at 45.3Kph?

I had momentarily lost my night vision due to a GPS backlight problem, but am reasonably confident that I hadn't tracked a bat.

Advice welcomed!

 

[pibbleb]

Speed gunned a badger, really?

I don't have answer for you, but I'm interested as to why you speed gun badgers.

Sorry to highjack thread.

P

 

[copper_head]

You're kidding right?

 

[bushtank]

sorry but was you near a road cos the badger was probably stuck on the front of a car bumber

 

[ady05]

they may be into skateboarding

 

[Goose]

Dunno what kit you were using but it sounds like the 20/20 used in the mobile vans, they get walls travelling at 20mph but are apparently 100% accurate!

 

[JonnyP]

Last night whilst speed gunning badgers in my local wood I recordeded the following velocities:
+/- 1Kph to +/- 3Kph with an average of +/- 1.45Kph. Fairly normal. One result stood out however.

Has anyone else clocked a badger at 45.3Kph?

I had momentarily lost my night vision due to a GPS backlight problem, but am reasonably confident that I hadn't tracked a bat.

Advice welcomed!

I tend to get an average of +/- 1.53, so slightly more than you, but I have never heard of one as much as 45.3.......I am wondering if you actually saw the very rare meles meles superchargedicus. In all my years of studying, I have never come across one, but have often heard tales of one being seen. I congratulate you in actually recording one.......

 

[Celtic Dragon]

Who fed them speed!!!!

 

[Toddy]

There's the apocryphal tale of Lothian police speed gunning a low flying tornado...... and the pilot having a panic moment when he realised that the plane's on-line systems had logged the scanner as an *incoming* and therefore a viable target

Badgers can shift when they need to, the usual fight, flight or (can't think of a polite word that fits here ), adrenaline surges, but I wouldn't have suspected 45Kph

That said, bearing in mind that this list is in Mph, it's not outwith the speed of a dog.

http://www.factmonster.com/ipka/A0004737.html

Cheers,
Toddy

 

[Mungo]

Haven't seen any badgers moving that fast...

I did, however, come across some plans for a rocket-propelled badger - perhaps this is what you saw:

Cheers,

Mungo

 

[Shibari.surfer]

Last night whilst speed gunning badgers in my local wood I recordeded the following velocities:
+/- 1Kph to +/- 3Kph with an average of +/- 1.45Kph. Fairly normal. One result stood out however.

Has anyone else clocked a badger at 45.3Kph?

I had momentarily lost my night vision due to a GPS backlight problem, but am reasonably confident that I hadn't tracked a bat.

Advice welcomed!

Iwant some of whatever you had

 

[pothunter]

Why ?

Everdently my message is to short but I dont know what else to say.

 

[hiroo onoda]

Thanks Toddy. I can't say too much at the moment about the actual results of this survey, but I'm hoping that in time my research may help a lot of people, at huge profit to myself.

 

[PhilParry]

I can feel a new badger speed tax coming on.....

 

[Roy's Badger]

Hirooo, what model of speed camera did you use? As you are no doubt aware, badgers eyes are laser reflective in the 40-60 picoHz range and, coupled with the associated doppler problems if the badger is travelling at 90 deg to the beam (whilst looking directly at the camera), may have caused a velocity error. It might be worth upgrading your camera to a Speedbird 6000, or checking the Tandy catalogue for possible upgrades. Check the wildlife section on page 651; they'll have what you need.

Good luck with the research. Please feel free to PM me for my last research on 'Badger velocities and the cure for the common cold'.

Oh, and is Scotland so hostile that RAF crews worry about the ground to air threat these days? And is it linked to badgers?

 

[Toddy]

..........................
Oh, and is Scotland so hostile that RAF crews worry about the ground to air threat these days? And is it linked to badgers?

See post #6
Actually, I think it was Lothian polis who were more worried

I spoke with a friend who does a lot of night time walking; he said that an angry badger will beat a dog over a short distance.

Cheers,
Toddy

 

[davef]

my wife followed one down the lane in the car and it was clipping along at 30mph! before diving through a field gate.

 

[hiroo onoda]

Thanks for your help, it may well have been a badger at full tilt then. This information will be fed into my calibration unit to help identify approaching mammals while I'm asleep under my tarp.
Roy's badger- I can't reveal the model I use in case my boss is logged on, but its a lot easier to use than my old arrangement. That was not unlike one recently seen on Johnny Kingdom's badger play ground, ie a large hamster wheel. My version used ticker tape to estimate badger velocities but the tape would normally break and ruin a nights work.

 

[Mungo]

I am most curious - despite my addition of a rocket-propelled badger picture - I still cannot imagine why you would want to measure the speed of a badger, and how you could possibly profit from this. Or am I completely missing a joke here?

 

[hiroo onoda]

Zemmiphobia is a condition that affects hundreds of people, some of whom, i calculate, must be into bushcraft. My prototype nocturnal detector unit is almost ready and when available should ensure that they get a good night's sleep in the woods.