Badgers And Sarcoptic Mange

Can you get a badger with mange?  "No" is the usual response and most state the same as the Scottish Badgers group:

 https://www.scottishbadgers.org.uk/information-hub/faqs/#:~:text=Badgers%20have%20fleas%20and%20lice,badgers%20to%20suffer%20from%20mange.

"Badgers have fleas and lice that have co-evolved alongside badgers, so cannot survive off of a badger. They may also carry ticks, which are known to spread Lyme's Disease. In some areas with a high density, of badgers, mange could be transmitted, however it's not very common for badgers to suffer from mange."

And that is a line still put out today but I have been seeing a few cases of badgers with mange and that mainly because I monitor what goes on regionally and nationally. The big problem in dealing with wildlife health is getting the information. In the UK it has proven impossible to get research papers related to foxes and badgers as you must belong to a university, college or recognised organisation. Doesn't matter if you are a mammalogist who has spent 50 years running a study on foxes or 40 years on wild cats; you are not getting into that magic club!

A point is the following from a paper published in 2010 and, of course, access is blocked.

Sarcoptic mange in badgers in the UK by Collins, R; Wessels, M E; Wood, R; Couper, D; Swift, A in . The Veterinary Record; London Vol. 167, Iss. 17,  (Oct 23, 2010):668. DOI:10.1136/vr.c5672

“WE would like to report the identification of sarcoptic mange in badgers (Meles meles ) from south-west England.

“An adolescent female badger was received for postmortem examination, following the deaths of four other badgers in the same locality over a two-week period. All the affected badgers were suspected to be from the same sett. The first four animals to die were described as thin, with areas of hair loss and abnormal-looking skin, although this was not confirmed by veterinary or laboratory examination.

“The badger received was in poor condition, weighing 4.2 kg. There was severe thickening of the skin, showing varying degrees of alopecia, crusting and scaling over 90 per cent of the body surface, particularly affecting the flanks, ears and hindlegs ( Fig 1 ). Areas of suppuration were noted between the thickened folds of skin. A superficial lymphadenopathy was present. Examination of a skin scraping revealed the presence of numerous mites with the morphology of Sarcoptes scabiei .”

As I write even though this paper is from 2010 as a naturalist I cannot get access to it. The “magic club” does not allow access to such papers even if you are a “citizen scientist” -yet I can get recent technical papers from the United States and Europe. This is why education on wildlife as well as research is hindered because the “great unwashed” are not allowed to view. To those who do allow free access to research papers Thank you.

But if mange was reported in 2010 why is it everyone is still insisting mange in badgers is “rarely seen”? Ahem: “not allowed to know” and that makes it hard for wildlife rescuers. I know of a badger treated for mange in the Peak District (Northern England) and other parts of England so it is not that rare and there may be many factors as to why we have seen badger mange since the 2000s.

Above (c)2024 Kate Hennessy

An article in New scientist is of particular interest and well worth a read.

Humans spread more viruses to other animals than they give to us

Michael Le Page

"Animals such as rats are often regarded as disease carriers. But when it comes to the spreading of illnesses, it turns out other animals have more reason to fear us than we them.

"An analysis of viral genomes has found that when viruses move between humans and other animals, in 64 per cent of cases it is humans infecting other animals – rather than the reverse.

“We give more viruses to animals than they give to us,” says Cedric Tan at University College London. For instance, after the SARS-CoV-2 virus jumped from bats to humans, possibly via another species, humans passed it on to many other species.

"Tan and his colleagues have been using a global database of sequenced viruses to study how they jump between species. There are nearly 12 million sequences in the database, but many are incomplete or lack data on when they were collected and from what host species.

"So the researchers narrowed down the 12 million to roughly 60,000 high quality sequences with full accompanying data. They then created “family trees” for related viruses.

"Altogether, they identified nearly 13,000 viral lineages and 3000 jumps between species. Of the 599 jumps involving humans, most were from humans to other animals rather than vice versa.

"The team wasn’t expecting this, but in retrospect it makes sense, says Tan. “Our population size is huge. And our global distribution is basically everywhere.”

"In other words, a virus spreading among humans will have numerous opportunities to jump to many other species all around the world, whereas a virus circulating in a non-human species that is limited to one region will have far fewer opportunities."

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2423977-humans-spread-more-viruses-to-other-animals-than-they-give-to-us/?utm_source=nsday&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nsday_260324&utm_term=Newsletter%20NSDAY_Daily

Above two (c)2024 Owen Rogers

Someone wrote: "Hmm , makes me wonder about mange in foxhounds … widespread dog excrement in the countryside, carrying TB etc … kept in kennels, multi-dog situations and ability to spread disease extensively throughout woodland and farmland …. putting heads into dens etc. There are 220 registered fox hound packs, god knows how many beagles … UK cattle population in filthy living conditions and across fields , cow muck spread on everything…. Run off into rivers …."

And, of course, all of that can be checked by people on the internet and remember that hunts do not notify authorities if any of their hounds or horse contract bTB -they just get hauled out into a yard and inhumanely shot (and there is video footage of that -some of it making the national news). The countryside is far from pristine as it used to be in the period up to the 1990s.

Above (c)2024 GG

Dog walkers and humans in general are spreading things around the countryside and about 15 years ago I wrote how some park wardens were complaining about the amount of vegetation being killed off by dogs urinating all over an area and the problem of dog faeces was another problem considering what they contain and that spreads out.

Above (c)2024 Louise Powell-Hills

You may well give your dog wormer treatment as well as something for ticks and fleas but they can still carry them until they drop off and attached to another animal.  It may well be what is happening with badgers and mange; I have reference books on wildlife going back to the late 18th century onward and in not one is mange mentioned in badgers. They are described as meticulously clean and the only time mange is mentioned is with imported foxes (something else to thank hunts for). We do know hedgehogs can get mange and, again, these are mainly ones in urban areas where there are lots of pet dogs and cats.

The other factor could well be population stress leading to greater susceptibility. The current government plan is to exterminate entire badger populations in England based on the inept and faulty (I do not like to use the word but) 'science'.  Over 250,000 badgers have so far been killed and that includes badgers known (and tested) to be TB free. There are illegal badger killings but authorities tend to turn a blind eye to that unless publicly embarrassed. And then we have an estimated 100,000 badgers a year killed on roads. That puts breeding populations under stress and we know that a population of animals under stress suffer health issues. 

We can treat badgers just as hedgehogs with mange are treated and I am waiting for a wildlife hospital to give me specifics that I can post here. I was told by one wildlife rescue:

"Any animal that needs medical treatment however will need to be brought into a rehabilitation centre or trapped in a crush for medical intervention I'd assume due to needing a veterinary surgeon to prescribe the medication needed. The laws on treating wildlife has been altered in the last year or two."

Yes, mainly "if it's wildlife kill it" (that is a subject for another post). A few wildlife rescues are now treating animals such as foxes in situ because treatment tends to work better when foxes are not trapped (stressed) and then held in a cage at a rescue (stress). How do we know treating foxes with mange works better in situ? Because it is being done in Bristol and other parts of the country. I have seen a fox that previously the local wildlife people would have put down even though it looked alert, was eating and its body condition was fine but no fur; treated on site it is now looking even better and is growing back fluffy fur. And there are other "put to sleep" condition foxes given meds and treated on site that have recovered.

When it comes to a badger with mange then it needs to be treated on site. It can be awkward but you should not expect wildlife work to be easy. Lactating sows you need to treat carefully and I hope that the wildlife hospital can advise even though I note people have posted on how they are treating mange in badgers we need professional advice. The same applies to hedgehogs of course.

I have not been able to contact some of those whose photos/screenshots I have used but would like to say THANK YOU as these are good photographic records of badgers in various states of mange.