What It Means To Be A Badger

"What It Means to Be a Badger" brings together all of the stories, as told by the most outstanding voices of the Wisconsin program and guaranteed to enhance your passion for Badger football. It's not just one tradition, one season or one particular game--it's the stories coming from the student-athletes and coaches who made the magic happen over the decades that capture the true essence of representing the University of Wisconsin.

LONGLISTED FOR THE BAILLIE GIFFORD PRIZE 2016 Charles Foster wanted to know what it was like to be a beast: a badger, an otter, a deer, a fox, a swift. What it was really like. And through knowing what it was like he wanted to get down and grapple with the beast in us all. So he tried it out; he lived life as a badger for six weeks, sleeping in a dirt hole and eating earthworms, he came face to face with shrimps as he lived like an otter and he spent hours curled up in a back garden in East London and rooting in bins like an urban fox. A passionate naturalist, Foster realises that every creature creates a different world in its brain and lives in that world. As humans, we share sensory outputs, lights, smells and sound, but trying to explore what it is actually like to live in another of these worlds, belonging to another species, is a fascinating and unique neuro-scientific challenge. For Foster it is also a literary challenge. Looking at what science can tell us about what happens in a fox's or badger's brain when it picks up a scent, he then uses this to imagine their world for us, to write it through their eyes or rather through the eyes of Charles the beast. An intimate look at the life of animals, neuroscience, psychology, nature writing, memoir and more, it is a journey of extraordinary thrills and surprises, containing wonderful moments of humour and joy, but also providing important lessons for all of us who share life on this precious planet.

Roommates Skunk and Badger head out on a rock-finding expedition that becomes much more dangerous than they ever expected in this second book of the national bestselling and award-winning odd-couple series that has been compared to Wallace and Gromit and Winnie the Pooh Buried in the heart of every animal is a secret treasure. Badger’s is the Spider Eye Agate, stolen years ago by his crafty and treasure-trade-dealing cousin, Fisher. Skunk’s is Sundays with the New Yak Times Book Review. When Mr. G. Hedgehog threatens to take the Book Review as soon as it thumps on the doorstep, Skunk decides an adventure (“X marks the spot!”) will solve both their problems. Badger agrees, and together they set off for his favorite campsite on Endless Lake. But all is not as it seems at Campsite #5. Harrumphs in the night. Unexpected friends. Then Fisher appears, and Badger knows something is up. Something involving secrets, betrayals and lies. And a luminous, late-Jurassic prize. In a volume that includes full-colour plates and additional black-and-white illustrations by Caldecott medallist Jon Klassen, Newbery Honor author Amy Timberlake takes readers on a second adventure in the new series reviewers have called an instant classic, with comparisons to Frog and Toad, Winnie-the-Pooh and The Wind in the Willows.

A fascinating insight into the badger’s world. Badger biology, life in the sett, rescue & rehabilitation, consultancy, badgers & farming, and badger-watching with George Pearce – an expert on badgers. George has surveyed over 700 sites, visited 1,500 setts, been consulted as an expert in 120 animal cruelty cases and rehabilitated more than 100 badgers. Brought up on a farm, he earned his living as a farmer for 45 years. Today, he is a badger consultant and one of the foremost experts on the British mammal he admires the most. For many years, the RSPCA, police, veterinary surgeons and conservation groups all over the country have relied on George Pearce’s knowledge and his instinctive feel for animal behaviour. Now you can share in his experience and enthusiasm for badgers from his 70 years of badger watching and his vast professional wildlife experience.

The first title in a warm and witty illustrated chapter-book series from Newbery Honor–winner Amy Timberlake and superstar illustrator Jon Klassen, about a pair of unlikely animal friends Analytical and set in his ways, Badger is taken aback when jolly, easygoing Skunk rings the doorbell to announce he’s Badger’s new roommate. (Badger may have been ignoring his landlord Aunt Lula’s letters . . . ) But as Badger begrudgingly opens up his home—and heart—to Skunk and his unconventional ways, the two characters become irrevocably changed by each other, establishing an odd-couple friendship that is timeless and real. Set in a brownstone in a town that evokes a slightly-more-urban Hundred Acre Wood, the story is part Wind in the Willows, part Wallace and Gromit. Filled with a delightful population of chickens, sheep, stoats, hedgehogs, voles and philosophical musings, it establishes the perfect scenario for illustrations by Caldecott Medal–winner (This Is Not My Hat) and Honor illustrator (Extra Yarn, Sam and Dave Dig a Hole) Jon Klassen.

Do you know that Badgers are considered fossorial and they create underground dens?And do you know that the state animal of Wisconsin is the Badger?It is sometimes difficult to make our children understand the beauty of nature, to make them appreciate the small things, the beauty of a flower, the freshness of the air, the scent of grass. Often, we are not fortunate to be in contact with nature, far from a meadow, closed in the cities. Still, so often, while looking out from our balcony in a beautiful country house, we know how to observe but do not appreciate creation's beauty.Know the details and habits of zoo animals as common as it is surprising, through a simple path, which fuels your child's interest and curiosity. That's the purpose of this book.But beware, prepare for the challenge!You will have to be able to answer the questions that your child will ask you by showing off their deep knowledge in the microworld of the Badger: -Mom, do you know what the three main types of Badgers are? I do!-Hey dad, do you know what type of food that Badgers enjoy the most? I do!-Grandpa, do you know what the word Badger means in French? I do!-Grandma, do you know what the front paw of a Badger looks like? I do!-Sarah, you're my big sister, and you've studied a lot, but I bet you don't know where Badgers are found at! I know that.You don't need anything else; just one click on "Buy Now," and you will let your child live a magical new adventure with his new friend Badger and the magic natural world of zoo animals.

Never before has wildlife narration been this bold and this hilarious. More than 40 million people have viewed Randall’s honey badger video, “The Crazy Nastyass Honey Badger.” “It has no regard for anyone or anything—it just takes what it wants! What a little badass!” When viewing wildlife footage, who hasn’t thought at times, “Ewww! What the hell is that?!” Randall thinks it — and says so! In Honey Badger Don’t Care, Randall examines and humorously informs on a dozen crazy, nasty animals of the wild kingdom employing his unique style of telling it like it is! His wildlife writing is refreshingly honest. If an animal scares Randall, he’s not afraid to share. Unlike most nature writers, Randall doesn’t deliver the sugarcoated or drab description. He “goes there” and shares his true feelings with his audience. Because of this, his readers feel that they can relate. Randall loves animals—even the ones that terrify him. He may not agree with how these animals conduct themselves in the world, but Randall wants everyone to know who they are. Just as he introduced the world to the honey badger, the Jesus lizard, and others, so will Randall shed light on twelve bizarre and interesting animals. Designed with callouts, sidebars, and more than fifty photos, Honey Badger Don’t Care presents a wildlife book for adults—hilarious, irreverent, profane, yet charming, chatty, and informative. Don’t be stupid—buy this book!

Bovine tuberculosis is seriously damaging the UK dairy and beef industry. Many farmers believe culling badgers must be part of the solution, but in 2013 a record 300,000 people signed a Downing Street petition asking the government to stop planned culls of badgers in Somerset and Gloucestershire, fuelling media controversy and signalling the beginning of a social conflict that was acted out in studios, streets, fields and village halls across England. The four-year trial culls, which began that year, aimed to establish that culling was a viable way of tackling the disease, but the widely divergent experiences and values of policy-makers, farming, conservation and animal welfare supporters means that decades of science on the disease in badgers and the effects of culling has not helped resolve the dispute. Reporting on original, UK research council-funded social science, this book takes on the challenge of understanding the contrasting views involved. Listening carefully to what the different protagonists have to say, the book unpicks the way science is interpreted to sustain differing conclusions, and considers how social science thinking could contribute. The book develops a critical perspective on the increasingly important literature influenced by new materialism, the social science response to the Science Wars, and explores the extent to which a social movement around opposition to the culls is emerging. In approachable prose, this access-all-areas account describes the struggle to develop understanding through the messy process of research and the difficulties of scientific analysis and philosophical thought. As such, it provides a valuable resource for both research practitioners and teachers within the social sciences, as well as an accessible way for biological scientists, conservationists and farmers to reflect on the issues around the management of disease in livestock and wildlife.