Foxes are found throughout the UK and are a common sight in both the countryside and urban areas. The number of foxes in a particular area typically depends on the amount of food available and they have adapted well to living alongside humans.
Our gardens and surrounding areas can provide them with plenty of places to shelter and lots of food sources.
Foxes enjoy a varied diet. It tends to be seasonal, with a significant proportion of their Spring/Summer diet being made up of insects and fruit. They will supplement this with mice and rats all year round.
In the Winter, food will be more scarce and they will eat anything and everything they can find, including the contents of your bins if they can!
We are often asked whether it is OK to feed foxes that visit your garden. We are very supportive of you doing so. Life is tough for the urban fox. Only 1 in 3 cubs will make it to adulthood and if they do, their life expectancy is only 18 months. Against these statistics, we think they deserve all the help they can get (particularly during the Winter).
Another benefit of leaving food out for visiting foxes is that it will establish a feeding routine which will enable you to keep an eye on your visitors from a distance and allow early intervention if any are sick or injured.
If you want to feed your visiting foxes, we recommend the following:
- Cooked or raw meat (but not cooked bones)
- Grain-free/high protein dog food
- Good quality/high protein kibble
- Eggs
Please always leave a bowl of water out for the foxes and other visiting wildlife.
Like any wild or domesticated animal, foxes are prone to injury and sickness, the most common causes of which include:
- Road traffic accidents
- Poisoning
- Fights/attacks from other predators
- Self-inflicted injuries as a result of irritation from Mange
- Caught in snares, fencing, or wire mesh
If you are worried about the health of a fox, we recommend that you call us in the first instance and we can advise on what steps to take next. Every case is different and it is important to keep both you and the fox safe.
It is very helpful if you can take photos and videos of the fox to show us what your concerns are. It is important to remember that the fox is a wild animal and we do not recommend getting too close to a sick or injured fox as it will be very scared and may react badly out of fear. Making yourself known to the fox from a distance instead might be a useful indicator of how sick or injured the fox is and whether it is still mobile and capable of escape.
If it is not possible to assess the fox’s issues immediately, it may be necessary for us to monitor it on an ongoing basis using a wildlife camera. We have the equipment to do this.
We are reluctant to relocate foxes to our rehabilitation centre unnecessarily and so will always treat them on-site first if we can. We operate a trap, treat, release policy. If there is no sign of a break, infection or swelling, we would typically give the fox medication on-site and give it a couple of weeks to improve whilst remaining in its own environment.
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Mange, or scabies, is a parasitic mite and is the most common infection in foxes. It is pandemic in the Wirral fox population, and its curable. We’ve identified and treated hundreds so far but there’s still work to be done.
Mange causes fur loss and dry infected skin, typically around a fox’s rump and face initially. It then spreads across more of the body, with cracked skin leading to secondary bacterial infection and often conjunctivitis. Eventually, if left untreated, the fox will become bald, lethargic, underweight and generally incapacitated. At this stage it is difficult to fix and hospitalisation will be the fox’s only (slim) chance.
This means that it is really important to identify a mange infection as early as possible. The fox can then be treated early and in its own environment, maximising the chances of a successful, stress-free outcome. Depending on the severity of the mange infection and on the visiting patterns of the infected fox, the mange can be treated with either homeopathic Psorinum or vet-prescribed Bravecto. We provide the medications and equipment needed to administer them.