Although a few badgers live alone, most live together in groups. A group of badgers living together is called a clan (or sometimes a cete). A clan is usually made up of several adults and their cubs. A large clan may have a 12-14 adults, plus cubs.

The clan will normally occupy a single sett - which might be quite large. However, the sett may also include other subsidiary setts, which are used from time to time - for example by nursing mothers, or badgers who are allowed to live nearby on the periphery of the clan society.

In the clan, badgers have a "pecking order" in the hierarchy. Mostly, the clan will be dominated by a single adult male (called a boar), who will try and control all the females (called sows) for breeding purposes. As young boars grow bigger, they will try and rise up the pecking order to become the dominant boar. This process will result in many of the younger badgers being ejected from the clan, and they will either have to force their way into a nearby clan, to form their own clan or to live alone. Sows also have their own pecking order, and will try and rise up the hierarchy to become the senior sow. It is believed that fewer females are ejected from the clan.

Members of a clan can recognise each other by their smell. The badger has a special opening (called a gland) under its tail, which produces a smelly liquid called musk. To a badger, with a highly sophisticated sense of smell, every badger smells slightly different. Members of a clan mark each other with this musk; when they do this we say that badgers are musking or setting scent. By "swapping smells" like this, each badger ends up with a smell that is special to his or her clan. Accordingly, each badger has their own unique smell, plus the common odour of the clan.

Importantly, though, badgers don't just use their musk to mark each other. They also stop from time-to-time on their travels to leave scent on the ground. This helps the badgers to find their way around their territory using their sense of smell. In this way, badgers find it easier to follow regular trails to and from good feeding grounds, as well as avoiding encroaching on territories of other neighbouring badger clans.

If a badger leaves the clan it quickly loses its distinctive "clan" smell. This is a great problem for animal rescuers, as they need to rescue an injured animal, get it treated at a vets, repaired, recuperated and returned to the clan as soon as possible. Delays of as little as 24-hours can cause problems. On return to the clan, if the badger is missing its expected clan smell it will be dealt with as though it is an outsider. It will probably be bullied by other badgers, and possibly ejected from the clan or killed by other badgers.

Sometimes rescuers can get a badger back to the clan in good time. During the rescue they will try and avoid imparting any of their human smell on to the badger. If this is not possible, and there is a real risk of the badger being rejected, it might be possible to "puppy-walk" the badger around the territory, so the clan gets used to its smell once again. This will make it a little more likely the other badgers will treat the returning badger kindly, and not as a threatening intruder.

The other option is to place a rescued badger into a new sett. This is easiest where there is an existing empty sett, and you can place a group of rescued badgers into it as a new clan.

Note:

Sometimes people often get confused between the name of a group of badgers.

The badgers which live together as a family-type group is called a clan.
The collective noun for a group of badgers is a cete.