It's almost exactly a year since the fox cubs appeared at the back of our garden. Last year there were several obvious signs that the cubs were close at hand: a pregnant vixen, a lactating vixen, strange rustling noises at night. Unmistakeable really. This year though, virtually all those signs are absent. We've had a single sighting of a vixen, and precious little feeding activity by the young male. If he had young to feed, I would expect his search for food to be much more organized, and somewhat more frantic. The odds are then that we won't have a family of foxes this time around, though we may yet get occasional visits as the neighbourhood cubs start exploring further afield and stumble across our place.
As for the young fox, he's probably the laziest fox in the vicinity. Most of his days are spent sleeping on rooftops. It's obviously warm and safe up there, and he ignores the pigeons just a few feet away from him. Quite clearly he isn't busy feeding a growing family.
Saturday snooze
The biggest risk is from circling seagulls when he decides to get up. He's learnt to duck!
As for the old dog fox I suspect he may be busy raising young, but not locally. On his occasional visits he tends to be very business like. Into the garden, a quick scout round, and gone. None of the lazing around that the younger fox enjoys. Further afield I have seen other foxes roaming at night, generally very late and outside the immediate territory.
It will be interesting to see how the year develops. I'll continue adding material to the Quick Pix and video pages over the coming weeks.
SittingFox
15 Apr 2007Sounds like the older dog fox's vixen's earth (ugh, what a mouthful!) is indeed a long way off 🙁
I love these photos of rooftop foxes – something I see very rarely 😀
His ears are enormous :eyes:
wickedlizard
16 Apr 2007that last photo is brilliant!
Flying Red Fox Blog
16 Apr 2007Probably the Vixen didnt have cubs this year or they are due late? I hyope you get cubs in your garden soon, lovelly pics too.:)