City foxes braver but not smarter than rural cousins, apparently

| August 10, 2023

The study, published in Animal Behaviour, left puzzles in foxes’ habitats for them to solve to get rewards of food. City foxes were more likely to touch the puzzles but both sets of foxes were equally likely — or unlikely — to solve them. I strongly suspect that the city foxes thought “nah… can’t be […]

Well, you don’t see this every day…

| June 4, 2021

We were having lunch a couple of days ago when we spotted an unusual visitor to our bird table…! We are reasonably sure that no birds were harmed — they would have flown away long before this vixen had made it up there — but surely bird food isn’t that appetising for foxes? (It’s not […]

Urban foxes “diverging from their country cousins”

| June 3, 2020

According to an article on the BBC here, new research shows that urban foxes are tending to have smaller brains and a differently-shaped snout to their country cousins — smaller brains because they do not need to pursue so many different types of prey, different snout as an adaptation for urban foraging. We haven’t been […]

Pushing the light….

| May 11, 2020

Good thing the camera can cope acceptably with low light if you ask it nicely….! Mum and two of the cubs decided to come out and check out the food, but first the cubs decided they weren’t weaned just yet!

Cubs in the sun

| May 10, 2020

It was a nice sunny day on Friday (which is more than can be said around Fox Towers today, at least). And the cubs decided to come out and show themselves in the sunshine. We have at least four — I wouldn’t be surprised if there was at least one more waiting to show itself, […]

2020 cub debut!

| May 6, 2020

It’s a strange world you’re coming into, kid, but welcome anyhow…

Doors are tricky things…

| January 13, 2019

One of our local foxes decided to come and investigate the house the other evening. Sitting on the back doorstep, they looked as though they were considering whether it would be warmer inside and possibly also have food — but the door was of course closed. One of our cats came over to investigate and […]

Sunbathing

| February 7, 2018

Although it’s been quite chilly here the past few days, it has been sunny for much of the time. With the sun come the foxes — well, they come out from their dens, anyhow — and they seem to find the roof of our shed a good place to sunbathe. Possibly the tar-paper covering it […]

The shed has its uses

| December 18, 2017

It is, by this point, a fairly old and knackered shed. (I won’t be surprised to find the foxes living in, rather than under, it one of these years.) But its tar-papered roof still provides a handy sun-trap and vantage point for the foxes at this time of year.

Just snoozing in the sun

| November 17, 2017

Lazing on an autumn afternoon….!