THE DISTRIBUTION OF THE BADGER IN ESSEX 3
forming the built-up area of London. They occur at several points
on the edge of the built-up area within the boundary of the
Greater London Council but only where the housing is broken by
areas of substantial woodland or open countryside.
Further out from London, badgers are generally distributed,
being particularly common at South Benfleet and Langdon Hills.
They occur sporadically through most of the flat lowland area to
the south of the Blackwater Estuary and on some of the islands
in the Thames Estuary. In central and northern Essex, they are
uncommon in the Rodings, but are generally distributed up the
Hertfordshire border and around Colchester, Too little informa-
tion has been received from the Suffolk border area but it is
thought that here too there is a general distribution of badger
setts.
Habitats in which Setts are Found
There is such a variety of habitat used by badgers in Essex
for locations for setts, that it can probably be said that, with two
exceptions, anywhere where the ground surface is relatively
undisturbed, badgers may be found. The two exceptions are
coastal salt marsh and inland areas subject to flooding.
The most common habitat for setts is in woods and copses,
usually but not always, on a hillslope or where a bank is avail-
able. Hedgerows are also frequently used, especially where a
change in ground level is involved. Other setts occur in stream
and dyke banks, old sand, chalk and gravel pits, overgrown gar-
dens, an abandoned sewage works, railway and road embank-
ments, an old shooting butt, open parkland, in the earth embank-
ment around a new reservoir, forestry plantations, on golf
courses and on open dairy farmland. However, most setts occur
in woods, copses or hedgerows, and the other habitats mentioned
above only account for about 10% of the total number of setts.
In Southend badgers used for a short period a pile of 12 inch
diameter metal pipes for their sett. The badgers had been dis-
turbed from a nearby hedgebank by the erection of a new gas
works and by the deposit of the metal pipes in a pile on top of
some of the holes of their sett. Although not in use when visited,
large quantities of bedding had been pulled into some of the
pipes on the bottom row. Four animals were moved from this
site to Epping Forest.
Factors affecting Distribution
Much work has been devoted to the relationship between soil
type and badger sett reports (see Allen & Cowlin, 1971) and
while in the past this relationship has clearly been the pre-
dominant factor in determining their location, today man's use of
the land and his attitude towards badgers are probably equally
important factors. When Essex was covered in the most part by