Suggestions of action you can take:
- Keep all domestic refuse in wheelie bins or closed containers, NOT plastic bags.
- Only put your refuse out on the morning of collection.
- Protect all animals and livestock.
- Do not leave food out for other animals, e.g. cats, dogs, rabbits etc. Be extremely careful where you put food to feed birds, this should be in approved containers.
Do urban foxes get mange?
In some urban areas yes. Mange is caused by the itch mite Sarcoptes scabiei, which burrows into the skin. Exactly the same mite causes mange in dogs and scabies in humans. In some rural and urban areas mange is currently prevalent in foxes: it is very virulent and infected animals invariably die.
People often see foxes that look very thin, and with their fur coming out in great tufts, so that they look almost hairless. In fact it is very different and a normal course of events.
Foxes moult once a year; this starts around April, and they lose much of their fur, so they look extremely thin and scruffy. Often only the grey underfur is left, so that they have large grey patches on the shoulders or flanks.
The new winter coat grows throughout the summer, and this process is usually only completed in September or October.
Can I stop the foxes stealing objects from my garden?
Foxes are both inquisitive and very playful like dogs. This means they not only scent mark objects that interest them, but are also quite likely to play with or chew them.
Gardening shoes, gardening gloves, anything made of leather, balls left in the garden, dog chews and other pet toys, and clothes hanging on washing lines are all played with, chewed, or in the late spring/early summer removed to take back to the earth for the cubs to play with.
The only recourse is to ensure that you do not leave such items in your garden overnight if foxes frequent the area.
Why do foxes foul my garden?
Foxes use faeces to mark their territory, that is why the faeces are always left in conspicuous places, e.g. on top of a compost heap, or on garden walls. Excessive fouling is often due to immature foxes attempting to break their territories or where several foxes are competing for a vacant territory.
Once a fox has established a route through your garden, it can be very difficult to stop it. An adult fox can pass through a hole C (10 cm) square and can scale a C (Aim) fence or wall with ease.
It is extremely difficult to stop foxes passing through your garden. Any measures taken are best carried out during late summer and autumn. This is the time that cubs become more adventurous, the family groups are starting to break up, and the foxes are endeavouring to establish new territories.
It is rare for this nuisance to be anything more than occasional, and although fox faeces are very smelly, they pose little disease risk. Foxes are prone to many of the same diseases and parasites as domestic dogs, including the roundworm Toxocara canis, the larvae of which can cause blindness in children. However, the chance of catching this from foxes are remote, and so far there are no known cases of children catching toxocariasis from foxes.
Why do foxes digging up my lawn?
Foxes dig shallow holes in lawns, bowling greens or playing fields when they are hunting for earthworms and grubs; they eat a large number of cutworms (the caterpillars of moths) and beetle larvae such as wire worms. These only come near the surface of the lawn in wet periods and so this sort of damage is seasonal. It occurs mainly in wet springs and warm wet autumns.
