Blooming foxes!

Although we have one that visits our neighbour for food every night I haven't heard any foxes this winter. Some years they have been quite noticeable.

I actually like to hear them. We get more problems with the young ones who make a heck of a racket in the summer but again - what a priviledge to live to close to wildlife.
If we hadn't wanted to hear wildlife we shouldn't have moved to a house opposite woodland.
I do wish they wouldn't poo all over my front garden though- never the back garden- I think the cats frighten them off.
I love hearing the owls too.

Whitewave.Take it you live in the U.S.A ?.

It's their mating season, what else do you expect? They're not even bothered about food just now, don't take the scraps I put out for them - other things on their minds.

I wonder when I read posts like the one at the head of this thread - do you really want to live in a world where the only animal species is the human one? Be careful what you wish for.

My last house backed onto land full of noisy night wildlife - plus all the yowling cat neighbourhood. We nearly all had cats because it was so safe for them. My city friends when they came to stay would say how noisy it was at night until they got used to it. Ear plugs are the answer - or try listening to soothing music or audio books through sleep headphones.

I live in the country and often hear animals in the night but the worst noise by far in the bird scarers during the day - a constant loud bang.

Urban foxes are an absolute menace in my very built up area of London. We often have four or five in the garden at night, fighting in the flower beds, pooing on the children's play equipment, dragging bags of used nappies into the garden and chewing them, distributing the gel they contain which kills patches of lawn, leaving fast food containers all over the place and so on. I found a whole pigeon buried in a flower bed and all the dislodged plants scattered around. I also found the bones which were all that remained of the rabbit belonging to the child next door, buried in my compost heap a year after she discovered nothing in the rabbit run but its entrails. It was killed mid afternoon. I would never have left any of the grandchildren alone in the garden before they were out of nappies as fixes seem to be attracted to wet nappies.
And I just hate the stink, especially after rain, which enters the house via ventilation bricks and extractor fans.

Earplugs - my GP recommended Blu-tack when I wanted to protect my ears in the swimming pool. It also works well for me when I go on holiday with my snoring sister. I'm sure it would be a good defence against the screaming foxes. I just keep my double glazed window shut.

I think there is a deterrent you can buy that keeps them away, though you may still hear them if they simply move nextdoor.

I'm sure I also heard that there are smells they don't like. It may have been vinegar but perhaps others can tell us.

Elegran, you are so on my wavelength!
I am not called Foxygran for nothing!
I'm very fond of both urban and rural foxes. They have a very raw deal in life; being hunted, shot and poisoned.
A bit of noise while they're mating is not bothersome to me, though granted, it can be very loud!! I'd wear some earplugs for sure, if it bothered me. I suppose the thing is that if you're woken by their noise and you enjoy having wildlife around you, then you snuggle back under the duvet, content to think that other species on this planet are also enjoying a life. If you aren't so fond of wildlife, then the noise may be irritating and impair your sleep. A little bit like me listening to vandals or drunks out on the Lane, perhaps. Maybe the answer is to read a few books about foxes and acquire a love or respect for them!

But anyway Tanith, hope you get some more sleep.

If no-one in built-up areas abandoned fast-food remnants or regularly fed foxes, and rubbish was always in bins with good lids, then there would not be enough food to support urban foxes, not just the debris left by the humans, but the rats and mice thriving on that debris (whose numbers are lower where foxes are active, BTW).

A vixen would need a bigger territory to keep herself and her cubs fed on caught vermin, so there would be fewer in each area. There might well be more noise when the youngsters were setting up for themselves in September/October and seeing off competitors but the overall noise would be less.

The area would be more pleasant for the human inhabitants too.

People should NOT feed foxes! Artificially increasing their numbers ruins their normal survival instincts. They will not know how to find their own food, nor will they teach their young to hunt.

We had a plague of mange here in my city back in the 90s and seeing the dead bodies of bloated foxes on pavements was heart-breaking as well as disgusting. The council could not keep up. They are still a problem, but not as bad as then.

Their feces are horrid for people and pets. They dig up gardens, overturn planters, and urinate on everything. Why do you think wheelie-bins were brought in... before that bin-bags were strewn everywhere, and that brings RATS. Some people still don't bother with a bin (they should be fined).

At this time of year I do not let me DGD play in our communal garden till mating season is over.

Thanks everyone for the input we are as usual diverse in our opinions of course I love to see the wildlife and as I said earlier like nothing better than to share our walk with Mr.Fox I just had a really disturbed night which I've now solved with my earplugs.
Did I say I wished them gone? I don't think so, I pointed out that I don't even agree with foxhunting so of course do not wish them dead margrete.

I think those of us living in an urban environment London in my case are struggling more than those who choose to live in the countryside because its a newish experience that we are learning to live with as the wildlife spreads into built up areas.

They're mating down here on the south coast too, though no noise last night. What I find more disturbing is that our garden is in their permanent route to the Chines.
Consequently the security lights flash on and wake me .... Do I assume it's 'the foxes' or do I get out of my cosy bed to check whether we have intruders in the garden.

I get up of course ..... One night I saw a badger drinking from the pond, stumbled around in the dark to find my phone to take a pic .... At which point the security light dimmed.

The foxes love sunbathing in our garden, moving around the plot following the sun. Drives my cat wild and he literally sees them off!

I read an article about foxes that stated that if an area gets too many foxes, the females don't come into heat so no litter that year. Nature's way of control.

When I lived in West London we had some foxes around now I live in Rural Devon I haven't seen one in the 2 years I've been here. Owls are heard nightly, but the thing that annoys me most is the pair of seagulls who nest on my neighbours house - you'd think there was hundreds of them!!!! I live about 8 miles (as the crow flies) from the coast

I think there is a deterrent you can buy that keeps them away, though you may still hear them if they simply move nextdoor.

I'm sure I also heard that there are smells they don't like. It may have been vinegar but perhaps others can tell us

There is a freely available deterrent - men's urine, so just send husband to pee regularly in the garden. Its really good for lawns too.

sorry starlily106 - there is no scientific evidence to that effect at all. Would be good if true tho.

On Christmas Eve my great nephew's tiny flock of hens and gorgeous Maran cockerel were all killed when the wind blew their henhouse door shut and his father assumed his son had shut the door - of course the hens were actually shut out. What was worse was that they live next door to the village church and we actually walked over the feathers coming out of church on Christmas Day - dreadful.

Foxes live in the garden behind us, and the family seems to get bigger every year. These houses have been here for 100 years, so it is not a question of taking over their territory; it's about food, as someone has said. I used to like them, until I fed one a sandwich and saw its teeth. I thought, "what could that creature do to one of my cats?" No more free lunch. I have seen the remains of a pigeon torn to bits in my garden, often find their poo, and of course there is the stench. Someone told me he saw one with a SWAN in its mouth! I understand some councils in England will shoot them. Not here in Scotland...The screaming really is the least of it, although that often wakes me up too. It is so horrible, it must give nightmares to children. I hate them (foxes, not children).

leurMamie foxes and cats avoid each other I don't think you need to worry about your cats and really no one should be feeding them anyway its not good for them and its encouraging them into your garden of course.

I have noticed that my local foxes have been very noisy this year. We also have a local muntjac deer population which can scream loudly when disturbed.