Beware-foxes about in this weather

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Lucylou

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Just worth mentioning especially to the newbies who might not have gone through a winter yet.
BEWARE - of foxes in this cold spell :evil:
Make sure you do all your nightly checks & lock up your girls. Also don't think they aren't about during the day either. Doesn't matter if you're town or country Mr Fox doesn't care ............Grrrrrr

Bitter experience talking :cry:

(.......One give away though, you can see the little blighters footprints clearly in the snow)
 
And the prints are easy to tell from a dog with a little experience.

Here is a guide that shows the tracks of some of the critters we have here, both the Grey and the Red fox are on the page too. The pads are different then those of a dog.

http://www.mdc.mo.gov/nathis/mammals/autogrph/index.htm
 
Thats really interesting. At a glance the Fox, Dog & Cat are similar but the shape & size differs so anyone not suspicious could easily be fooled!

I'm glad we don't have to worry about so many critters as you, I'd be a nervous wreck!!
 
Saw fox prints when we had the last lot of snow - amazing to see their routes around the farm - you can almost tell what they were thinking. Very interesting that there were none around the poultry houses which are beside the shelter with the llama and alpacas in - the prints came within about 10 metres and veered off! I was also able to tell where they were coming in - we have gaps in the boundary hedge.

The tracks where easily identifiable as they were similar to a dog but long/thinner and you could see the indentations of the claws at the front of the print.

They are supposed to be wary of llams and alpacas and those tracks seemed to suggest this was the case :D

Doesn't mean there is any room for complacency though - I'm sure they act as a deterrant only.
 
One good thing about the snow is that you can see the fox tracks-so you are perhaps a bit more aware- I have one fox patrolling the field where I keep my chickens (about 5 miles from me) and one doing nightly wanderings in my garden too - where I keep some growers- They're just waiting for the day I slip up and forget to put them away! :evil: We've had two bantams taken (fox or bird of prey) during the daytime- Sadly that's a risk I have to take for my chickens to live a truly free range life.
 
The local farmer has shot 8 in the last 12 weeks. Luckily the hens area is fox proof with 10ft fencing and overhang, but I also have quadbeams running 24 hours a day around the boundary, so if anything gets in an alarm goes off in the house and also on my mobile.
 
I must be lucky.

I keep an eye out for them but in the eight and a half years I've lived in my village, I've never seen or heard a fox nearby. I see the occasional one a few miles away but that's about it. I normally complain about the local dogs barking and owners letting them cack in front of my garage but I think that's what also keeps them away so don't mind so much now. I wish they'd cack further along the back lane though :x

I think I have more to worry from the local dog that attacked the hens in the first place rather than foxes.

Stoats I'm not so sure about and the nearest badger set I know of is a good few miles away.

Osric
 
I really wish that we could let our birds free range but with all of the predators that is just not possible. Even if I had stout fencing I would have to cover the entire place with netting to stop air attack from Hawks and Owls.

I once saw a Badger when I was about 15 years old, well this year I have seen three of them so the population is on the upswing. Coyotes are thick too. They are about the size of a German Shepard dog but much more intelligent. Raccoons, Opossums, Bobcats and Skunks round out the line-up where we live but in Eastern Ok they have Black Bear and in other places there are Mink and Weasels.

I did have a Skunk around here that would not bother the birds and I would leave eggs out for him to eat. I had the live trap set out to catch ferel cats, another big problem here, and I caught him so I turned him loose. Here are some pics of him in the trap and wandering off after I propped open the door. Just click on the pic to enlarge.




 
Forgot about mink!
There's some in the area but they've only been seen in the nature reserve a few miles away where they eat the duckies and bunnies.

Black bears? That's nothing! We have bloodthirsty rampaging er, hedgehogs... :? and I saw a hare last week in the field that looked at least hmmmm er, 2 feet tall!!!!!

Not only that, back in September there was a roe deer in a field which I once saw eating, wait for it.........

GRASS!!!!!!!!!!!


The British countryside just isn't as wild as it used to be is it? Someone should genetically engineer a herd of aurochs just to liven things up a bit :D


Osric
 
Osric,
you should try down here,close to me we have wild boar rampaging through the F-o-D,and in Scotland they have wild Haggis roaming the Highlands with the Grouse.....only the Haggis will catch and kill anything that moves......we don't need auroch's as well lol :lol: .
 
I was thinking of wild boar as I typed the last message along with the alleged big cats running around the countryside. There's stories of a big cat running around County Durham. I'm a bit dubious about this though, there's always sightings of a big cat but never any finds of its kills.

I'd still love to see some aurochs though!

Osric
 
Hi all and a happy new year,
in the last 30 years we have lost chickens to the fox, many years ago we were just so tired we forgot to close the shed door and the fox took 25 birds it was heart breaking to see feathers spread in every direction, the only bird he didn`t take was a very old moran and to be honest I would not have tackle her either.
At the moment we have a very good game keeper who controls the local fox population, but in recent weeks we have heard and seen more foxes than ever before.
Fox hunting does take place around here and we suspect that foxes are being dropped in the area, it seems strange that we have so many at this moment in time. !!!!!
Sleep with one eye open and an ear trained on the chicken house and all should be ok.
Bye for now Heather
 
The subject of foxes is always a difficult one for me, I've seen so many threads turn into a scrap on other forums over the years because it only takes a couple of different opinions about killing foxes and hey presto!

I must admit, because of this, I tend to be a bit guarded about what I say regarding foxes and try to stick to the facts - there are a few things I strongly believe in:

First, when people say "The one night I forgot to lock them up and the fox came..." Foxes will visit every night. You can set a clock by the time they visit - they will do the rounds and one night, when the opportunity is there you lose birds. The VSB Automatic Door Closers are a life saver for me and although they cost over £100 each, if you lose a few birds, you've soon lost that.

Secondly, they live in small groups (communicating to one another by barking which is what you can hear at night) and are territorial. When you shoot foxes in your immediate area, others will move in to occupy the territory. This is important to keep in mind if you use an electric fence - because if the foxes in your area have tried to get in, they have learnt they cannot and will not attempt any more. New foxes will try until they get a shock and may just succeed. Vixens will have more cubs if their numbers dip... clever eh?

I think there was an urban fox study done in Bristol that I read about a few years ago and they said that they tried to shoot all of the urban foxes in a given area - they failed - badly. The numbers dipped but recovered very quickly. In the end, I think they gave up.

As for other predators, a friend has just lost a number of wildfowl and Guinea Fowl to a Stoat. Clever little things and hard to catch...
 
a farmer friend was losing a lot of poultry last year and sent his son out to shoot them on the hill behind his farm as he found out urban foxes were being relocated there,
he shot 16 in a not huge area and the farmer has not lost anything since .... yet
 
Unfortunately,the R.S.P.C.A. used to relocate urban foxes into the countryside.Which was unfair on the foxes and very unfair on livestock and people living in the country.
I thought they had stopped this practise now.....obviously not.
 
Its been very interesting with the snow on the ground, seeing the footprints. Tim's right on the bit about a regular route, like a fixed railway track! One evening just before Christmas, in the first lot of snow, I saw 'our' Fox cross the road & sit on the wide grass verge outside our house, bold as brass, just looking at the road then calmly meandered off down the road.

I've found a website that sells various fox deterrent products,I'd like to be able to let my chooks out when the weather gets better, but only when someone's around. I'll need to make then as safe as poss, has anyone tried 'Scoot' does it work?

Electric fencing might have to be an option but its expensive, does it really work though? Anyone had trouble previously with foxes that has stopped after installing one?
 
Lydia--we live in the middle of a real foxy area, always coped ok with them with EXTREME care , this year however they started bringing cubs into garden playing around chicken houses , I invested in some electric netting , touch wood, it seems to have done it , tracks in snow on outside of netting but none inside-and it must be shorted out in the snow-I think they smell the electics somehow-the ponies definitely do! - it cost £300 -phew- but I think/hope it was worth it. Ros
 
Tim - I think you are absolutely right- my mum has a saying " It's not the ones you kill - it's the ones that come to the funeral" She always maintained that if there is a vacuum it will be filled and like any animal or bird they will produce more offspring if there is the food source to sustain them and territory for them to take over. The one thing they seem to have respect for is electric fencing.
 
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