Okay, so this isn’t cutting edge popular culture, but bear with.
Badgers, protected species, deceptively cuddly but vicious and massively destructive black and white bastards. Anyone out there plagued with the feckers? And if so, have you had any luck getting rid of them from your garden, humanely and legally of course? They must have a sett nearby, but their visits to trash my garden occur almost every night. I’ve tried the recommended steps – citronella oil, bright lights, urine (don’t ask), but the buggers are just laughing at me and even smile for the security camera. I’ve even thought of playing Nickelback at them, but that may veer into inhumane territory. Any ideas?
In my area, Herefordshire, near Welsh border it seems shooting them and leaving at the side of a country road (to get mashed up) is the popular way.
FYI, fortunately they don’t seem to get to my garden (unlike the local bloody cats that use it as a latrine)
Might I suggest that you consult with the world renowned astrophysicist, animal rights activist and occasional musician, Sir Brian May whose current thing appears to be coos* and badgers?
https://www.bbc.com/mediacentre/proginfo/2024/34/brian-may-badgers-farmers-and-me
* I’m Scottish
Sir Anita Dobson always pops up when badgers are mentioned. Laudable as his activism may be, I suspect he’s not bothered by the buggers personally, or his country pile is big enough for him not to care about living alongside them.
I will just leave this here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CxSuFB-hK8A
We encourage them to come in our garden because we love to see them.
They like peanuts.
This isn’t having a go at you @boneshaker, but I’ve thought for ages how it’s funny how we get all hot and bothered when other countries kill their wildlife but go along with exterminating thousands of our own. The same with trees – we used to be covered in forests and then cut them down to build world conquering ships and enable farming, but we tut tut when the Brazilians want to farm the stuff we want to buy. Badgers are coming into our gardens because they are being forced out of their habitats in the wild.
Comparing rain forest deforestation with probably a few square miles’ worth of oak trees? Seems legit.
I’m not advocating harming badgers in any way @NigelT, far from it, but delightful as they may be to observe in their natural habitat, they can be unwittingly immensely destructive to humans – guilty of the whole gamut from destroying gardens to building setts under buildings that can cause subsidence. It can end up being hugely costly and time consuming to deter them.
Never had a badger in my garden (probably to built up to be honest – foxes, yes but no badgers).
Friend of mine who lives in the countryside has plenty in his garden, and several photographs to prove it.
Look harmless, but they really aren’t – known to get quite p*ssy (especially the photo of three of them fighting over cat food, whilst a forlorn hedgehog looks on)
But who is grooming the Badgers ready for the Badger Parade?
Parade’s off, RD.
Dun-Dun-Duuuuuun!
Squirrelgate Mk II
Wasn’t there a rock band in the 1970s called Badger?
I seem to recall that Roger Dean designed one of their album covers.
I’ve certainly never heard any music by the band. Were they any good? Do we have any ardent Badger fans among the Afterword Massive?
I have heard their music, I think I got it out of the record library when I was a kid. I can’t remember anything about the music. Tony Kaye from Yes was a member of the band. I like his playing on The Yes Album, I’m a sucker for Hammond organs.
Gawd. Yes, that’s the one. It grooves along for a bit, then the drummer does a fill that doesn’t fit. At least by my reckoning. The soul influence is nice though, as is the organ playing.
That drummer is awful. Really needs to dial it down considerably, but probably incapable of doing that. The singer’s voice is too thin-sounding*.
Unmemorable faux funky rock. Good players all but misguided.
*Didn’t realise till the end that it was a live recording.
For a professionally-released album on a major label, the recording quality is not good. Even for those days.
Yeah – that’s the Roger Dean album cover – that’s definitely the one!
@duco01
IIRC, Dave Brock was a founder member
Arf
Game, sett and match to @Jaygee.
I don’t remember them at all! So much so that I thought this was a piss take at first and a riff on the band name Budgie.
I think Badger were one of the many bands who fell foul of the great Punk cull of the mid to late 70’s.
Sort of. It was a bit early to have been killed off by snotty punk rascals – 1973. Tony Kaye’s involvement was the reason why I optimistically bought the LP – unheard. I concluded shortly afterwards that the band had promise on that basis alone, but needed more time to settle in. And maybe a little pruning before going into the studio.
The album has, to my ears, the hallmarks of hastily released works-in-progress, and was recorded (not particularly well) long before the band had become settled and practised. A shame, really. It was probably funded on the basis of Kaye’s credentials by a record label (Atlantic in the states) with cash to splurge on the strength of other band’s sales. The original release was expensively presented – it had the lyrics on the inner sleeve and a truly glorious gatefold sleeve with a big pop-up cardboard badger too! Whatever its flaws, I still enjoy a lot of it.
One further (studio) LP release, where the band have run a mile from the progishness of the live album, only to produce a deeply unconvincing (and occasionally gratingly winceful) white soul sound and that was that, they went their separate ways.
Could not resist..