The fox takeaway
Posted By Foxy Lady on May 24, 2010
Usually, when I’ve put down food for the foxes, things happen in the following order:
- The local bird life descends to grab what they can before the foxes get to it. This usually includes a couple of pigeons (after the peanuts), a magpie or two (after whatever they can get, frankly), and at least one crow. The crows are especial fans of the cheese, although empirical evidence suggests that crows cannot fit two chunks of cheese across their beaks — two pieces lengthwise is not a problem, however.
- Mrs Fox turns up to take some of the more easily-portable pieces of food back to the den, or to be cached in other places nearby. Some of the places the foxes cache food really don’t seem to be worth the extra effort; they often stash some next to the pond, which must be all of four feet from where it was put down in the first place. Mrs Fox will usually come out a few times.
- Some or all of the cubs start accompanying Mrs Fox, and they’re mostly happy to eat the food in situ rather than taking it any distance away for stashing — although they may take it a few feet away from the feeding area for closer inspection or to play with it.
These photos are from 14th and 17th May; the weather wasn’t up to much on those days and the cubs didn’t come out during daylight (or at least what my camera will believe is daylight!) But Mrs Fox was quite happy to take some food back to the den from the Fox Takeaway that is our lawn of an evening…
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