Fulham F.C. of the early grounds listed below are likely to have been parks and parkland, which have now been developed. Even when the club purchased Craven Cottage and the surrounding land in 1894, they had to wait two years before they could play a game there. The Fulham mascot is Billy the Badger, who was the winning design sent in by Kyle Jackson after an online competition by the club. Billy the Badger wears the number 79 Fulham shirt, in reference to the club's year of founding, 1879. Controversy first surrounded Billy when he tried to cheer up Chelsea manager Avram
Badger need no stinking badgers!” In Europe, badgers were traditionally used to predict the length of winter. The badger is the state animal of the US state of Wisconsin and Bucky Badger is the mascot of the athletic teams at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. The badger is also the official mascot of Brock University in St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada; The University of Sussex, England; and St Aidan's College at the University of Durham. In 2007, the appearance of honey badgers around the British base at Basra, Iraq, fuelled rumours among the locals that British forces deliberately released "man-eating" and "bear-like" badgers