Wild Badger Cubs

 

I felt immensely lucky on the 18th of June to witness two wild badger cubs with their mum as they emerged for their nocturnal activities.  I am so grateful to my photography buddy for taking me to the site he has been visiting for many, many weeks. How wonderful to see such an elusive animal and be lucky enough to capture some photos and video footage before they moved on in their explorations.  

It was important to be in position before the sun went down to avoid disturbing the badgers.  Sitting there as the light diminished, I kept adjusting the settings on my camera, constantly dropping the shutter speed as the ISO shot up.  I held my breath, hoping a badger would emerge before the light disappeared making photos impossible.  I was lucky, so lucky.  Not only did the badgers emerge in time, but they foraged around for a magical 20 minutes.  

The featured photo was taken at 10.13, not long after they appeared.  I was using a Canon R6 mirrorless camera with electronic shutter so as not to frighten them.  I had my trusted Canon 100-400mm EF mount L lens attached via an adapter.  My shutter speed was 1/50 sec, with the aperture at f5.6 and auto ISO locked at ISO 20,000.  In post-processing, I used Topaz DeNoise to remove as much of the grain from the high ISO as I could without damaging the image.