Leaving home

It's been very quiet here this week: the young foxes seem to have left home 🙁

We've not seen any of them since Saturday night, when Skinny put in an appearance. She was as good as ever, and I managed a few decent photos of her, including this one. Her overall condition was good, and her tail improving although still very distinctive due to the impact of mange.

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Skinny has a particular habit of jumping over the sage bush to get from one side of the flower bed to the other. I've been wanting to capture her leap for a long time and nearly managed it on Saturday. It's not quite the shot I wanted (fully mid-leap would have been perfect), but it may be the best shot I'll get, so I'm including it here.

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The disappearance of the cubs was expected, based on my more limited experience last year when the single cub vanished at the end of August (re-appearing briefly in late September). It seems that there is a definite behavioural pattern with the young foxes moving away from their original territory as autumn sets in, presumably finding new haunts for the winter and perhaps establishing new mating units. What does seem odd is that no newcomers take their place; or at least not yet. There is of course an alternative possibility, which is that they just emerge much later into the night and I simply don't get to see (or hear) them, but I do suspect they have moved on.

All this movement has meant that Skinny has missed the final dose of the mange treatment (due on Tuesday). I doubt that it's a problem. She got the first three treatments and was clearly improving, indicating that the mites had been eliminated. The fourth treatment is largely a back-up dose, and her condition was never that bad and certainly not to the extent that some foxes suffer. I'm reasonably confident that she'll be fine.

Coinciding with the departure of the youngsters is the now regular appearance of the dog fox. His reappearance lends support to the idea of territorial shifts, as this is very much his patch and he seems to be making a strong bid to reclaim it. I think it was on Sunday night that I heard some cubbish squealing from under one of the shrubs as he went past. I didn't see which cub it was though and the cub wasn't about to show itself with him around.

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Dog Fox on Sunday

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This Post Has One Comment

  1. anonymous

    16 Sep 2006

    TheWhiteFox writes:

    I also expected this and wondered how fox watchers would take it so I never tried to bring it up but now I guess they have to go on as nature intends them too. Very sad that two of them have already passed away. Well, I hope that the other foxes will be fine and mate to have more kits around next spring.

    At least the dog fox came back and is 'reclaiming' his territory meaning that the vixen still might be around since they usually mate with one partner for life (I forgot the scientifit term for that). Hopefully more kits for next Spring then. Maybe the dog fox will keep you company for the winter 😉

    You are so lucky to have foxes so close to you, I already tested my area and it's for sure that no fox comes around my backyard 🙁 Maybe now that the kits are moving on everywhere, I should do another test (hide an egg outside and check up on it). I hope no raccoons or anything gets it though but if the egg does end up broken then I'll do some more obversations.

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