Fox family help

babybottle · #1 (**permalink**) 09-06-2009, 02:35 PM

Hello, I live in a council house and am selling my house very soon and I have found a family of foxes at bottem of my garden. There is a male and a vixen who looks very old and healthy and 3 cubs of different sizes and ages. i saw them playing in the garden around sun set and the male sleeps in my neighbours garden if it is sunny sometimes.

I have starte to feed them dog food mixed with eggs and love watching them come up to the house and play around. But i am worried what will happen to them. I don't like or trust the localk council at all and am worried that they will all be killed when i sell the house.

is there anyone i can contact who will move them so they are safe? the burrow is in a very obvious area on a mud hill and id have thought they'd be more careful.

Words · #2 (**permalink**) 09-06-2009, 09:19 PM

Hi, that sounds like a real dilemma, but it's not really possible to 're-home' wild foxes like that. It's hugely unlikely that the council will do anything about them at all. Most councils accept that there are foxes, and leave them to it. You don't say what area you are in but usually there's information on council websites. I've not heard of councils killing foxes (there's no point as the population simply rebalances itself), so I doubt that that is a worry.

The foxes will start to disperse in the autumn as the cubs mature (they'll be fully independent by September, and feeding themselves before then). The adults may move off slightly earlier, and there are ways of speeding up that process a bit. First thing would be to stop feeding them anything, so that they have to spread out further to find food. Don't worry, they will find food even if you don't give them any. If you really want to encourage them to disperse, you could carefully disturb the den... the aim being to make it draughty. They may just then move on their own account. There's quite a lot of detailed information on TheFoxWebsite run by Bristol University.

But of course the people buying the house might love foxes. It would be a real bonus for someone like me, and I'm sure I'm not alone! In reality, I wouldn't worry (hard as that is). Foxes will move out if they are not welcome, and will find somewhere else easily enough. But if you are moving out, I would cut down or stop feeding because you don't know who will be moving in and how they (the people) will react to an over friendly fox.

babybottle · #3 (**permalink**) 09-08-2009, 10:34 AM

Thank you for the excellent advice and so sorry for not replying sooner. I have gradually stopped feeding the foxes and have not sold the house yet.

aland · #4 (**permalink**) 09-08-2009, 12:01 PM

Hi Babybottle, Try not to worry the parents have survived in your area and there is a good chance the cubs will, You did not say if you are in town or country, they have a better chance in built up areas apart from traffic as people do not normally carry shot guns, One of my sons found cubs in Banbury a short distance from his house tore off to buy food and discovered that at least three other people are feeding them, That was really nice to know, You should warn the next owners of your property about them and say there is no danger from them, Good luck, aland.

Beekeeper · #5 (**permalink**) 09-08-2009, 08:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aland

and say there is no danger from them,

aland, I have to disagree with you there, foxes are carriers of Mange and something else which is irritating to the skin of, especially dogs, my dog caught it from a fox and apart from the cost of treatment the dog for a while was not at all well. Pet Rabbits, Chicken and Ducks and other family pets are prey for foxes as are ground nesting birds, personaly i would shoot every fox i come across but obviously i appreciate other people do not feel the same way.

A good friend who is a local farmer used to have a dairy herd and one morning when checking round his fields he came across a young calf which had been born sometime in the previous night, before the calf had chance to get to its feet a fox started eating it, the calf was so badly injured he had to put it down, not a nice story but this is the nature of the fox, a ruthless predator.

BK

aland · #6 (**permalink**) 10-08-2009, 05:42 PM

Sorry to hear that you do not like foxes, But you know we cannot just say kill all predators birds,fish,mammals they are here for a reason,I dislike magpies, sparrow hawks, wasps, ants, but i will never attempt to take away the one chance they have at life, Please think carefully about these things, you did not choose to be a human they cannot choose their life, As for dogs coming into contact with foxes my seventeen year old dog and two old cats have been around fox cubs for quite a while, Cubs live in our hay shed and straw bays with seven pony's, my wife will sit at night and watch them come out ready to go hunting after rabbits etc, Please have a open mind on the subject of hating any form of life, aland,

Beekeeper · #7 (**permalink**) 11-08-2009, 07:44 PM

I do agree with you Aland, but sadly since foxhunting has been outlawed by this government they are beginning to breed out of control, numerous foxes have Mange and i have found some on the forest dead through it.

It will soon be a disaster for whats left our our ground nesting birds so if a few are shot once in a while, it will help other wildlife species survive.

BK

aland · #8 (**permalink**) 11-08-2009, 10:11 PM

Hi beekeeper, Yes there are two sides to every story, It is not worth getting into disagreements about the in,s and out,s on hunting, I like the idea that any thing get,s a fair go at life it is to easy to just say this or that creature should just die for the sake of it, any way we will say the matter is closed at that as we all have our own opinions,s, aland

mbaldw · #9 (**permalink**) 12-08-2009, 10:15 PM

Quote:

since foxhunting has been outlawed by this government they are beginning to breed out of control, numerous foxes have Mange and i have found some on the forest dead through it.

You raise some interesting questions there BK. Can I just ask, is this a perception that you have -- i.e. you're seeing more foxes around than before the Hunting Act -- or are there some new data on fox populations in Britain showing an increase post-2004? Also, are you coming across more foxes with mange than before? I was under the impression that the incidence of mange had actually declined (at the national scale) in recent years, although obviously this is an average and I'd be interested in a more local perspective.

Cheers,
Marc.

Beekeeper · #10 (**permalink**) 20-08-2009, 04:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mbaldw

You raise some interesting questions there BK. Can I just ask, is this a perception that you have -- i.e. you're seeing more foxes around than before the Hunting Act -- or are there some new data on fox populations in Britain showing an increase post-2004? Also, are you coming across more foxes with mange than before? I was under the impression that the incidence of mange had actually declined (at the national scale) in recent years, although obviously this is an average and I'd be interested in a more local perspective.

Cheers,
Marc.

Hi Marc,

Yes, i do seem to notice more foxes now that hunting has been stopped and certainly Mange has been more noticable in the local fox population, its not just me either, a friend with a smallholding shot one quite recently which was also full of Mange, a horrible illness which makes life very unpleasent for the animal.

BK