Volume 22, Plate IX / Mammalia (Mammals)

Badger

Meles Taxus

A very robust plantigrade with large full body, conical snout, short rounded ears, short strong limbs, and long blunt fore claws for digging, the upper parts light-grey variegated with black, the head white with a broad blackish band on each side. Concealed by day in a burrow of tortuous passages, it comes abroad at evening for roots, fruits, insects, eggs, and small creatures, is harmless to man, and bears three or four young in a grassy couch.