Badger (Franchise)

Badgers are animals only mentioned in How to Train Your Dragon Franchise.

Description
Badgers are small mammals from the Mustelidae family. They are related to weasels, otters, wolverines, and polecats.

Badgers have short, yet wide bodies with four short legs built for digging. They have long black and white faces with small ears and a powerful jaw. Their jaw strength is given by the mandibular condyles connected to long cavities in their skulls.

Vikings, most likely, came across the European Badger (Meles meles).

Diet
A badger's diet consists mostly of worms, grubs, insects, bird eggs, small mammals and reptiles, birds, and amphibians. They can also eat fruit and roots.

Function
The badgers have no function in the franchise. However, in reality, badgers are hunted for their fur or meat and even kept as pets.

Dragons: Riders of Berk
In Portrait of Hiccup as a Buff Young Man, Gobber mentions badgers while describing his treasure hunt with Stoick.

"We fought like badgers over the meaning of the clues."

- Gobber describing the treasure hunt

Dragons: Defenders of Berk
In Frozen, Fishlegs compares the pack of Speed Stingers with badgers.

"Fishlegs: Yeah, they came out of nowhere like a pack of wild badgers, scavenging and, uh-- Tuffnut: Badge-ge-ging. What? That's what a badger does. It badges."

- Fishlegs and Tuffnut about badgers