← All guides · Wildlife & the law · Updated October 2026

Badger setts in hedgerow banks in Gravesham: what the Protection of Badgers Act 1992 requires before any work starts

Raised hedgerow banks are one of the most common locations for badger setts in the Gravesham countryside. Before cutting back, grubbing out or reducing a hedge that runs along a raised earth bank in the rural villages, there is a specific legal check that applies quite separately from the bird nesting-season question: the Protection of Badgers Act 1992.

What the law says

Badgers and their setts are protected in England by the Protection of Badgers Act 1992. Two sections of that Act apply to hedge and bank work:

• Section 1 makes it an offence to wilfully kill, injure or take a badger, or to attempt to do so. This applies year-round. There is no seasonal exemption.
• Section 2 makes it an offence to interfere with a badger sett. Interference is defined broadly and includes: digging into a sett; causing a dog to enter a sett; using any article or instrument in a sett; damaging or destroying a sett; obstructing access to any entrance of a sett; and disturbing a badger while it is occupying a sett. Critically, the offence of damage or destruction applies whether or not a badger is present at the time of the work.

A "badger sett" is defined in the Act as any structure or place that a badger uses for shelter or protection. The key word is "uses": protection attaches to setts in current use, not to every historical tunnel network in the landscape, but a sett does not have to be occupied at the moment of the work to be protected. If field signs indicate it is being used, it is protected.

Penalties: conviction for an offence under the 1992 Act can result in imprisonment of up to six months, or a fine, or both. Each interference with a sett entrance is treated as a separate offence, so the potential liability for a job that damages a multi-entrance sett is correspondingly higher. Both the person commissioning the work and the person carrying it out can be prosecuted.

Natural England is the authority that issues licences for sett interference in England. There is no self-permitted route: lawful work that would otherwise constitute interference requires either confirmation that the activity falls within an existing class licence, or an individual licence from Natural England before the work starts.

What counts as a sett, and what counts as interference

Not every piece of hedge bank work risks a sett offence. Understanding the boundary matters, because the practical position from Natural England guidance is nuanced.

Signs of current sett use: the clearest indicators are entrances larger than roughly 25 centimetres in diameter with a characteristically flattened, oval or D-shaped profile; fresh spoil heaps outside active entrances, sometimes containing bedding material that has been raked out; badger hair caught on barbed wire, thorns or roots at the entrance to a sett or along a well-worn run; latrines (shallow scrapes used as dung pits) in the soil near the hedge base; and clear, heavily-used tracks running through the hedge line to and from the sett, typically 15-20 centimetres wide with a distinctive two-toed pad impression.

Interference that requires a licence: any work that physically damages a sett tunnel or chamber; work that blocks or partially blocks an entrance; excavation that runs close enough to a sett to collapse a tunnel; grubbing out a bank section that contains an active sett, and strimming, scraping or clearing the immediate base of a hedge over an active sett in a way that disturbs a badger present in the sett.

Work that may be lawful without a licence: Natural England's guidance acknowledges that many activities near a sett do not constitute interference and will not require a licence. Trimming the top and sides of a hedge above a bank containing a sett does not normally damage the sett. Vegetation clearance some distance from active entrances, where the sett structure itself is not at risk and the work will not generate noise or vibration that disturbs an occupying badger, may also be lawful without a licence. The assessment is site-specific. When in doubt, the guidance from Natural England's wildlife licensing team (wildlife@naturalengland.org.uk) is the appropriate place to start.

The pre-works check: a decision sequence

Step 1: look for sett signs before any work is planned or quoted

The first step is a field check of the hedge bank, ideally before the work is agreed. Walk the full length of the bank that the job will affect, checking for entrances, spoil heaps, runs and latrine pits. This does not need to be done by a specialist: a contractor who knows what to look for can make a reliable preliminary call. If there are no field signs of current sett use along the bank, and the bank has not previously been reported as a sett location, the risk is low and the job can generally proceed subject to the other checks (bird nesting season, TPO, conservation area notification).

If there are clear signs of current use, or if the bank has the kind of structure (deep, dry, well-drained, with mature tree or hedge root systems giving stability) that badgers favour, the next step is a formal survey.

Step 2: commission a pre-works badger survey

Where signs of current use are present or the habitat is strongly suitable, a pre-works badger survey should be carried out by a suitably qualified ecologist before the work is priced definitively or started. The survey records all entrances, classifies the sett type (main setts are the largest and most consistently used; subsidiary setts are smaller and intermittently used; outlier setts are single-entrance, less regularly used), assesses evidence of current use at each entrance, and produces a written report with recommendations.

The distinction between sett types matters because Natural England's licensing conditions differ: work near or affecting a main sett is treated more cautiously than work affecting an outlier, and the survey report will make clear which category applies.

Step 3: confirm the legal position from the survey findings

The survey will produce one of three broad conclusions:

• No sett present, or no field signs of current use. The work can proceed without a badger licence, subject to the other applicable checks.
• Sett present but the proposed work will not interfere with it. The ecologist may confirm that the specific task (for example, trimming the hedge above the bank, or working at a distance from active entrances) does not constitute interference under the Act. This should be recorded in writing. The work can then proceed as described, with care taken during the job not to damage entrances inadvertently.
• Sett present and the proposed work will constitute interference. A Natural England licence is required before any work starts.

Step 4: apply for a Natural England licence if the survey shows one is needed

Where the survey confirms that the proposed work will constitute sett interference, the correct route is an application to Natural England's wildlife licensing service. There are two routes available in England:

• Class licence CL35 (Badgers: licence to interfere with setts for development and other purposes): a class licence that authorises specific activities including badger exclusion and sett destruction in connection with development or to prevent serious damage. It can only be used between 1 July and 30 November inclusive. Work that needs to happen outside that window requires an individual licence. The class licence has specific conditions about how it is used and requires the work to be supervised by a registered person.
• Individual licence (application form A24): for development, agricultural, or other work that falls outside CL35, or where the class licence conditions cannot be met. Individual licences are issued within 30 working days of a complete application, and the licence conditions will specify how the work must be carried out, typically with ecologist supervision and mitigation measures such as temporary badger-proof fencing, creation of artificial setts and monitoring.

In practice, the ecologist who carries out the pre-works survey is the right person to advise on which licence route applies and to prepare or support the licence application. Natural England's wildlife licensing team can also be contacted directly at wildlife@naturalengland.org.uk with preliminary questions before a formal application is submitted.

Where the risk is highest in Gravesham

Badgers are widespread across Gravesham, but the density and sett density is markedly higher in the rural southern and eastern part of the borough than in urban Gravesend and Northfleet. The villages of Cobham, Shorne, Chalk, Higham and Meopham, and the farmland corridor running along the foot of the North Downs, contain a dense network of old field hedges, many of them carried on raised earth banks. These banks, built up over centuries from spoil cleared from ditches and root systems of layered hedges, offer exactly what badgers need: deep, well-drained, stable soil with mature root structure overhead providing support for tunnel roofs, and undisturbed ground that has not been regularly cultivated. Many of the hedgerow banks in these villages contain long-established setts that have been in continuous use for decades.

The London clay soil that dominates most of Gravesham is not the easiest ground for badgers to dig: it is heavy and waterlogged in winter, and can crack and compress in dry summers. Where the chalk edge of the North Downs comes close to the surface in the southern villages, the free-draining chalky soils and the well-structured loams over clay at the foot of the scarp slope provide considerably better conditions for sett excavation and maintenance. This is why the southern Gravesham villages carry a genuinely higher badger population than the Gravesend town centre or the Thames-side areas.

In practical terms: I ask about the bank structure and look for sett signs on every job in the Cobham, Shorne, Chalk, Higham or Meopham areas where the hedge runs on a raised bank or the client mentions badgers being seen locally. That check costs nothing and avoids what would otherwise be a serious legal problem mid-job.

Sources: Protection of Badgers Act 1992, sections 1, 2 and 14 (definition of "badger sett"); Natural England, "Badgers: protection, surveys and licences" (gov.uk/guidance/badgers-protection-surveys-and-licences); Natural England class licence CL35 (Badgers: licence to interfere with setts for development and other purposes); Natural England individual licence application form A24; Natural England, licence conditions for badger sett interference licences.