Farmers cultivate interest in badgers

The Times - 21st June 2000

By Valerie Elliott, Countryside Editor

• Click this link for more details of the Devon Badger Watch.

A FARMING couple are to sell their beef cattle because they are earning more by allowing visitors to watch badgers on their land.

Kevin and Anne Atkinson, who live near Tiverton, Devon, started their badger-watching business three years ago, and today up to 20 people a night turn up to watch the animals from a hide.

There are at least ten badgers living in the area around the hide and people can sometimes watch them for more than two hours at a time. The Atkinsons encourage the badgers to stay near the hide by feeding them peanuts.

English Nature approved the project and granted the couple a licence to develop the area near the sett. The couple also consulted the local Devon badger group about their business.

Mrs Atkinson, 43, said: "Beef cattle is a lot of hard work and without the badger business I would have had to find work outside the farm. But the new business is going well."

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