Wisconsin State Animal: Badger (Taxidea taxus)

Wisconsin State Animal - The badger was designated the official state animal of Wisconsin in 1957.

Although the badger has been closely associated with Wisconsin since territorial days, it was not declared the official state animal until 1957. Over the years, its likeness had been incorporated in the state coat of arms, the seal, the flag, and even State Capitol architecture, as well as being immortalized in the song, "On, Wisconsin!" ("Grand old badger state!"), and as the mascot ("Bucky Badger") for the Univeristy of Wisconsin-Madison. In 1957, a bill to establish the badger as the state animal was introduced at the request of four Jefferson County elementary school students who discovered from a historical society publication that the badger had not been given the official status most people assumed. However, serious opposition developed when a faction from Wisconsin's northern counties introduced a bill to make the white-tailed deer the official animal. The legislature reached a compromise by adding two official animals. In Chapter 209, Laws of 1957, it named the badger the "state animal", and Chapter 147 designated the white-tailed deer as the state "wildlife animal".

You can't buy a badger but you can buy Wisconsin Badger Apparel (Click on image below)

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