ENORMOUS fox

[wildsusy]

Hi all, was walking near Tilford in Surrey today and caught sight of what I initially thought was a large roe deer. But then it walked and it was sort of sloping along like a panther, with a long back, and had a long tail. I was very baffled, looked just like a big cat...I concluded it was just a fox, looking at its tail and pointed ears, and of course on further inspection it was fox shaped etc.. but it was huge! like deer sized..

what is the biggest fox you have seen, or heard of? How common is it for specimens to get so large and what causes it?

[sunnydale]

Originally Posted by wildsusy

what causes it?

Didn't you know?! They eat a lot of babies, of course!!






Sorry, couldn't resist!

[mbaldw]

Originally Posted by wildsusy

How common is it for specimens to get so large and what causes it?

Well, the 'monster' fox caught in Kent last Christmas was apparently 4ft long (although I guess at least 1ft was the brush, making the body ~90cm), which would be close to the bottom end of the range of Roe deer length (95-140cm), but this would be a small Roe, not a large one. Would you say it stood about the height of a Roe deer (i.e. ~65-75cm at the shoulder)?

The hunting literature contains reports of large foxes, but I have never come across accounts of deer-sized foxes and, assuming it was a fox, it would seem unprecedented. In fact, I could conceive a Roe deer with a mutation that caused it to grow a tail more easily than I could imagine a fox the size of a large Roe deer! If you go walking that way again, make sure you take your camera (and possibly a suit of armour!).

Cheers,
Marc.

[wildsusy]

I watched it for quite a while and watched it move, it was absolutely a fox, saw its brush and shape, but it was so large I honestly thought it was a deer before I saw its tail and movement..Honestly it was huge! It was both long, and tall, and substantial looking..

[mbaldw]

Interesting. I guess it couldn't have been a large dog (long-haired Alsatian, for example)? A lady recently sent me a photo of one of her huskies after it had been rolling in bonfire ashes and it looked uncannily like an over-sized fox. If you see it again and manage to get a photo (decent or otherwise), please post it here.

Cheers,
Marc.

[werdnal]

Google "red husky" and you'll see some examples. Not disputing what OP actually saw, but some the the huskies are certainly fox like!

[wildsusy]

nah it wasn't a husky, was definitely a fox. very distinctive tail and slender face.

[tom00_uk]

If you go to a take-away late at night in Bristol and sit down to eat it just off the main road close to a church yard or waste land, you will fairly quickly get up close to some quite large foxes thanks to all the junk food and easy to access bins providing a year round food source on top of the large rat population etc

the foxes i tend to see very infrequently when in Yorkshire are both thinner and also smaller in stature as there is not such a ready supply of discarded food so they have to work for their meals

when i lived in Norway a person up the road had a pet red and Arctic fox, soft as any thing as they had been raised as pets after being saved when young from the fur trade.

[bigdave60dog]

We all get things that we always "wonder" about. You may well have to put this down to one of them. The longer you live, the more things you see that make you wonder. I expected them to get less with experience.
Dave

[allyryan]

It was probably a large, very healthy dog fox. They are quite impressive and do appear larger than life. Beautiful creatures. I am not too far from Tilford either.