Dead badger

[Bushwhacker]

I saw a dead badger on a country lane last night.
It had no hair on it at all bar a few tufts at the bottom end of it and the skin was all black and shiny.

What could have been the cause of the hair loss? Was it before or after death.
There doesn't seem to be any evidence of carrion feeding on it either.

I've seen hundereds of dead badgers and never seen anything like it.

 

[w00dsmoke]

If the corpse is a fair age you will see obvious fly strike, but it's not uncommon for the hair to fall off and the body to become bloated and distended as well as coloured black in the heat in a short time. Look for eggs or maggots and if you can't see any it's not been there long.

It sounds like it's been there a wee while? The alternative it could have been dumped there. Any chance of a photo?

If you suspect wrongdoing contact your local badger group//wildlife cop and don't touch a thing on it, around or near it.

 

[tobes01]

I'm not sure when I last encountered a dead badger that (probably) didn't have a bullet in it somewhere. Apparently normal procedure is to shoot them and throw them out the back of the wagon on a main road. A gamekeeper friend told me of a chap he knows who has put a switch into his reversing light circuit so that he can bung the corpse out the back at night and reverse over it without an approaching vehicle realising what he's doing.

Not nice at all, and I certainly don't approve, but I can understand why dairy farmers get upset - my late father-in-law lost his entire dairy herd to TB.

 

[Bushwhacker]

Woodsmoke,
Yep, theres plenty of flies on it. I just stopped the car next to it and didn't undo the window because it looked pretty rafty and I'm not keen on the smell, so it probably had been there a while.

tobes01,
I've heard this several times too, it's nearly all livestock farming round this way and I don't doubt it happens.

 

[Spikey DaPikey]

Maybe someone made a load of shaving brushes ?