Damn those Pesky Foxes!

[Chartwell]

Dear DM,

You're welcome - I'm hoping for a response from Hillcourtcouple soon and before I have to go out for the evening, the very thought (which I am trying to banish from my mind)of that story is enough to put one of one's food!

[Michael Palaeologus]

I love the Hillcourtcouple. Its about time we got some proper rural values into the ED. I grew up in the rural Midlands (it exists). I shot and ferreted. Foxes and rabbits were my meat and drink, sometimes still twitching - but hey.

Nature is red in tooth and claw. Mr Fox will happily take your pet rabbit, white fluffy cat and gerbil. Make no mistake they will have your cuddly pets for supper with no qualms.

Get a grip ubanites, rural life has come to town and rural solutions are required.

[shambles]

ooo..i don't know mikewbate...i don't like the idea of foxes and their cubs being killed in this way. what if the trap doesn't kill them outright and they're trapped half dying in agony. also - what about the cats! these are people's pets. my neighbours would trap the trapmakers if their cat was killed like this. find it a bit freaky that people can rustle up such devices in their backyards, trap an array of animals then dig a pit and bury them - it's gruesome.

[Michael Palaeologus]

I hate the idea of upstting you Shambles Humane approaches would be found. Possibly a version of Deal or No Deal with capital consequences if the foxes get it wrong.

[shambles]

thing is i don't mind the foxes. ok so they're a bit noisy and they dig up plants and poo and wee everywhere and knock over wheelie bins - but apart from that what's the problem? i say leave them be. :)

[Michael Palaeologus]

A tad unhygenic dont you think? If they would just poo and wee in the wheelie bins there wouldnt be a problem.

[shambles]

true! although i couldn't tell you what a fox poo looked like - obviously have considerate foxes in my garden!

[Michael Palaeologus]

I think fox wee is more unpleasant. Very pungent and kills the plants.

Off to bed now.

G'night.

[dulwichmum]

Dear Mr Mikewbate, you are a fine one to talk about hygiene after what you have been doing to the Martha Stewart magazine. To the confessional box with you young man - and bring a cushion, you will be there a long time...

[Mark]

I believe foxes shouldn't be encouraged to stay in cities, the only reason they are here is because people feed them scraps and they eat the waste and rubbish we throw out. Here's a typical mangy city fox compared to a healthy country fox:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/81/FoxInHighPark.JPG/180px-FoxInHighPark.JPGhttp://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/ee/Vulpes_vulpes.jpg/200px-Vulpes_vulpes.jpg

The ones I see in London are like the one on the left and I think it's more humane to get them back to the countryside.

[Michael Palaeologus]

True Mark - but foxes are territorial - hence the pungent wee for boundary marking.

The coutryside is already fully populated by foxes - so they are pushing into the cities via railway lines - they trot long them rather than buy a ticket.

Dump an urban fox into the countryside and they will probably perish because they dont have a territory and will get beaten up by the sitting tennants and because they are pretty clueless when it comes to hunting - rural wildlife is wilier than fat urban rats, mice, pets and wheelie bins. Cubs are taught to hunt by their parents in the context of their territories - the urge to hunt is genetic, the ability is not.

The rural human population would also not take kindly to dumping yet more carnivores in their back yard and urban foxes being used to close human contact would be drawn to human habitation by hunger and so quickly get shot.

[Mark]

They're cheeky fare dodgers too! They're peskier than I thought.

[Jeremy]

If we were all more careful with our rubbish and didn't leave things for the foxes to scavenge, maybe they'd go away.

Mikewbate is right - foxes would not hesitate in killing another animal for its supper. But that's their instinct, not a considered decision by mr fox! I don't think it's instinctive for humans to trap/kill animals. You can't really compare the behaviour of foxes and humans.

[Chartwell]

I am not overly sentimental about foxes (having been brought up in semi rural Midlands) and agree that we all have a part to play in ensuring that there is nothing for them to scavenge. When I first read Hillcourtcouple's thread I thought the foxes went to the pit alive...! Reading the subsequent threads I hope that I was wrong about that. I agree something should be done - on page 23 of the attached document the question of what Southwark Council might do about foxes was raised. It also talks about the use of traps.

http://www.southwark.gov.uk/Uploads/FILE_7084.pdf

[fractionater]

pee in a bucket - you know it makes sense!

[Chartwell]

That top tip should be posted on Southwark Council's website.

[Michael Palaeologus]

Fox behaviour is instinctive and so they kill and cause mess. The human reaction is indeed not instinctive, but it is a reaction to fox behaviour. People have to decide what they concider to be acceptable.

Personally I have no problem with urban foxes. When I lived in the countryside I did have a problem with rural foxes because they killed livestock.

[tiddles]

I know this sounds bizarre, but I had heard that if a man urinated in the garden (at the boundaries) , it would fend off foxes - best to do it at night I feel.

good luck

[fractionater]

jan t - read this thread from the start - it has all been thoroughly discussed!

[Keef]

Mikewbate Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> The human reaction is indeed not

> instinctive, but it is a reaction to fox

> behaviour. People have to decide what they

> concider to be acceptable.

>

Why should we have the right to decide what is acceptable for a fox to do, and to kill said fox if it breaks our rules (rules that the fox isn't aware of?

It's a strange world, foxes get killed for eating livestock, simply because we're annoyed as we had intended to eat that livestock.... I'm not a vegetarian (much to the disgust of my better half), but I don't like human feeling of superiority over everything else on this planet... One could argue that that's how we've buggered the place up so much, through our own arrogance!

Ahem, sorry... *climbs down from high horse*

[fractionater]

Well if I catch doing in my lawn again.... then it will face the consequences!

[Michael Palaeologus]

Keef that view holds only if you see mankind as being outside of nature. Which we are not. We are an organism that acts to procreate our species at the expense of others - much as other do, its the selfish gene. We are more successfull and so that is threatening our own future and the futures of other species. Our rape of the planet is as natural as the exploitation of a host animal by parasite. The death of the host brings the death of the parasite.

Farmers protect their livelihood from foxes. If somebody or something started taking your property from you, you would act to stop it. The fact that this results in the death of a fox is somewhat irrelevant in the context of those of us who are carnivores (me included) and are therefore complicit in the slaughter of many thousands of creatures in our lifetimes.

The main issue is that many people are dislocated by the death and destruction that facilitates our comfortable life style. We either start living more challenging life-styles or we accept the destruction.

[Keef]

But if the selfish gene leads the way, surely we should all just be running on instict, much as the fox does in killing it's prey.

If we have the capacity to realise that our actions are destroying our planet, surely our instinct for survival should lead us to then try to save the planet... No?

[Michael Palaeologus]

Unfortunately it is not a collective instinct - it is an individual or tibal instinct. So our individual or tribal instinct to survive and thrive means that we compete for resources at the expense of other individuals and tribes even if this will lead to the destruction of the collective whole. For instance if we had a collective instinct for survival the international control of CO2 emissions would be easy; the more tribal survival instinct means that India, China and the US in particular are unwilling to give ground.

Thus we are all stuffed.

[mockney piers]

Have any of you been watching Adam Curtis' documentary about freedom all gone wrong.

Boiled down to it's bare minimum it says that much of our post war social topography (particularly post 70s) has been driven by theories from mathematicians who modelled us all as being inherently selfish creatures wh oare always trying to get one over everybody else to maximise our own chances of survival/income/comfort/breeding lines.

The problem being that this basis for the model of a market led society was ultimately bollocks, and we do have things like social bonds and altruism.

Interesting stuff, though he does push it on ocassion (Yes Minister as thatcherite propaganda anyone?!?!)

Oh yeah, foxes. pigeons are nice in Letchworth and manky in london. Same goes for foxes, it's not the noisy sex that annoys me, no worse than drunken students heading back to halls on denmark hill, it's the nasty mangyness. Pest like any other i say.

To paraphrase, a pigeon is a rat with wings, a fox is a big rat with good PR.