In the middle of the afternoon we were preparing some meat for dinner. I put the meat trimmings outside, expecting the Magpies to come for them, as they usually do. About half an hour later, I see a fox strolling casually past the window, bold as brass, on his way to pick up a snack... I grab the camera, by which time the fox is disappearing round the side of the house. A quick exit from the front door reveals the stern end of a fox rapidly retreating down the road...
I give chase, camera in hand... The fox moves across to the other side of the road and blithely begins to devour his meal, about 5 metres from where I stand.
I move closer, and he reluctantly retreats.
As I get within a few paces of him, the fox ducks through a gap in the fence of a neighbour's garden, and is lost to view.
At this point I give up and go back indoors to upload my photos (most of which were hopelessly blurry of course).
Ten minutes later Mr.Fox returns for second helpings, and I snap off several more photos in the failing light.
So, what do I do now? The foxes are so brazen that they will quite happily come prowling around my garden in broad daylight. What chance do I have of persuading them to avoid my garden? I think perhaps my best plan is to keep putting out scraps, in the hope that the foxes will be so well fed that they won't want / need to dig up my garden in the search of worms.
By the way, what do you think of the Red-eye Reduction feature I have used in the last photo? It seems to simply put a black dot in place of the shiny eye. Hardly sophisticated! I am very conscious that none of my photos of the fox are of good quality. I was just too excited to concentrate on getting the settings right, and the last ones were taken when it was almost dark, so using a very slow shutter speed. Ho Hum, I must remind myself that I'm not a wildlife photographer. Photographing veg is easier - they don't move.
I liked the photos of your intruder. I saw a fox the other day on the farm and, of course, no camera was in hand. The fox looks very comfortable in your neighborhood.
ReplyDeleteMy suggestion would be that you stop feeding him. He will eventually move on to someone elses house or do like we did with the raccoon, catch him and kill him. I agree he is a very fat fox, none of our look that well fed.
ReplyDeleteblock the hole in the neighbour's fence? I don't have any personal experience with foxes..they are usually sneaky but this one is brazen. It probably has babies or babies on the way.
ReplyDeleteI don't think trapping, killing or relocating will work. They are territorial and if you remove this one, more will move into the vacancy you create. Could you fence the vegetable garden?
ReplyDeleteWhat about sprinking really hot chili powder around the garden? We did this around the perimeter and it seemed to help with smaller pests; not sure if it would help with a hungry fox.
ReplyDeleteAnd I agree with you on not liking the black dot on the eyes. Oh well.
I think your best bet would be a fox proof fence around the area you most want to protect, I wouldn't feed them as you will only increase the amount of foxes your area is able to support. Fortunately I've never seen a fox in my immediate area.. as yet.
ReplyDeleteThe red eye reduction photo made me giggle Mark, nice dots!
ReplyDeleteI would have no idea what to do about a fox, especially one as confident as yours... Would it have a go at you? Or your granddaughter? That would worry me a little.
I would say that you could get a big dog. Foxes would avoid your garden then completely.
ReplyDeleteFew years ago I spent 2 weeks in UK and I was surprised how many foxes are there, walking through the town in the evening... We have foxes here, but they live in woods and rarely come down to a village and never get close to cities.
Nice shots! In case you use slow shutter speed, then better quality pictures are with tripod, so you don't move the camera.
Oh dear... So pretty, and so destructive! I have no idea how to deter him, though no scraps might be a start, so I think perhaps fencing might be the answer. Chicken wire around the veg plot?
ReplyDeleteRe slow shutter speeds, you can get nifty lightweight monopods or perhaps a chest pod, so that you can take great photos even in low light conditions and long shutter speeds. Mind you, I am useless at taking good wildlife photographs!
Is fox hunting banned in your country? I remember fox hunting were done in Boxing day when I lived in London around 1990. It might be controversial but do you think fox hunting should be allowed for protection agricultural production?
ReplyDeleteThanks everyone for your views and suggestions about the Fox problem. I think it would be exceptionally difficult for me to keep foxes out of my garden without going to huge lengths. If I were to erect physical barriers, they would need to be very tall, because I know foxes can jump high, and dig deep. Of course this would probably have an adverse effect on the aesthetics too! And for those of you who don't live in the UK, we have banned fox hunting with dogs now, so that's not an option. It might just have to be the chilli powder then...
ReplyDeleteHandsome Fellow!
ReplyDeleteYou could use the chile powder ON the scraps. It won't bother the Magpies but the fox will certainly feel the burn! I did that with some squirrels and the effect was immediate and highly comical!
How blatant! I'm getting fed up with them too. My daughter and I were both wakened several times during the night last night by a fox barking. It was the night before her History Higher prelim, so she was not amused at the broken sleep.
ReplyDeleteDavid, knowing my luck, the fox will turn out to be a Mexican one (on vacation in England) who loves chilli...
ReplyDeleteLinda; Just opposite our house is an area of open ground with some big trees; an area much loved by our local foxes as a trysting-ground I think, judging by the noises that emanate from there. The howls of the vixens are almost other-wordly sometimes.
ReplyDeleteIn the U.S., any wild animal may have rabies. Is this not a concern there? Our biggest enemy is the raccoon population and we have trapped over 40 on our 5 acres in the last 6 or 7 months. The animal control comes and gets them in the traps and leaves more traps. We use cat food as bait. I am not sure what the animal control does with the animals, but we do know that many of them are rabid and you can get it from their spittle, you don't have to be bitten even. Very dangerous. I have used cayenne pepper and oregano scattered around to deter them and they hate ammonia, so I have sprayed it around, too. Maybe these measures would also deter foxes.
ReplyDeleteEgretta; I think I'm right in saying that we don't have rabies in the UK, although it is occasionally brought in from abroad when someone smuggles in an infected dog. Being an island, I suppose it is easier for us to enforce border and quarantine controls.
ReplyDeleteI don't think the foxes are a danger to humans - simply a nuisance. For me, they are the biggest menace to my garden because they dig around in the soil, presumably to try to find worms, and thereby uprooting or destroying my plants in the process.
I have similar problem with yours but not fox but birds! They dig around the soil and uproot my plants and new emerging seedlings. They also help bandicoot potatoes when I don't want them too. So I feed them with left-over foods on the same spot. So it become a routine. They will follow us around the gain attention now but they don't bother the plants. I think because of us human they don't have many places to go to hunt food now. The means for survival make them bold enough to search for food outside their territory. This also happened to my parents house where monkeys come and distrub the plants becuase they lost their home to housing development.Fence?Monkey can climb higher than that;-).
ReplyDeleteYou can put a sign outside of your garden, for the fox:
ReplyDelete........GO TO THE NEIGHBOUR.......
I like his boots
ReplyDelete