[Marijke Jones]

Dear fellow gardeners,

Past weekend I found some bird feather at the side gate of my house but was utterly horrified that a fox dragged it through my tomato patch AND my La Ratte potatoes causing damage. I am probably not the only one that experienced this terror. I bought some animal repellent yesterday but not sure this will work to protect the rest of the garden.

Any tips are welcome.

[missmoneypenny]

I feel your pain. Here in south London we are infested with foxes. I have 2 issues: they defecate on my plot and it stinks. They also trample plants and crash into nets, smashing the plants under them when they are young, I’m afraid they evoke very un PC feelings in me. Nothing is 100% effective but a couple of things may help. I put sharp things under the nets eg broken sticks so when they jump on them they get a shock. I erect obstacles on the plot so they can’t have a clear run though, for example sticks, bricks, metal mesh etc.
Finally, they are thought to hate the smell of disinfectant so I brush Jeyes fluid on bricks and place them around the plot. Good luck!

[Subversive_plot]

I absolutely believe what I read here about the problems you have with foxes. But ...

We have both red and gray foxes here. We see them occasionally, but we have never had a problem with them. I wonder what explains the difference in behavior? We have more green and riparian areas here, and more varied wildlife, do our foxes have less of a need to get into gardens?

I might be whistling a different tune if I raised chickens though.

[Blewit]

Interesting about Jeyes Fluid on bricks. We're plagued with foxes too. They look incredibly healthy and in good condition, I know they're being fed by at least one well meaning gardener (and possibly neighbouring houses too) which might seem a kind thing to do but it's resulting in an artificially high population of animals that do not have to spend time hunting. Consequently without a pressing need to find food they can pass the hours messing about in foxy destructive ways, plus older foxes don't need to force young away in the usual manner to preserve a hunting territory.
It doesn't help either that more than a few plots on our 11.5 acre site are less than well tended. Large areas of dense undergrowth and brambles make ideal spots for an undisturbed den, and rarely visited sheds are ideal to dig under. It's OK these tenants saying they don't have time to look after their plots (followed by all the usual excuses) but it's the rest of us that ultimately suffer as as result of their inactivity.

[missmoneypenny]

Thanks for teaching me a new word @subversiveplot. Riparian. Here in London foxes are not shy, unlike their country cousins. They live a lot on discarded food and are used to humans, get close, rummage in bins and seem positively excited by anything that has come into contact with human or other animals. For example leather shoes drive them wild. They “ stole” mine out of my shed. Then they  mark their territory by urinating or defecating and the smell is awful
Here too @Blewit we have a well meaning lady who feeds them butter pellets laced with anti mange medication ( a lot of them are infested). That makes them even bolder. They are human habituated, urban animals and I would certainly argue they are pests.

[Subversive_plot]

Miss MP and Blewit:

Thank you... habituation to humans over there would explain the difference in behavior.

Over here, leaving food out could attract all sorts of animals you wouldn't want lurking about.  Coyotes and bobcats are a couple of them that can be far worse.  Raccoons also.  Any of our wild mammals can potentially carry rabies, which is nearly always fatal (I understand rabies is rare over there; we require pets be vaccinated but you can't do the same for wild animals of course, so leaving food out is considered a very dangerous bad habit).

Regarding riparian areas, they are common here, and our neighborhood has a number of springs and small streams with a wooded "buffer" area around it, which benefits our wildlife tremendously. I imagine most of our wildlife predators prefer those areas to risky areas closer to humans.

[New shoot]

Our urban foxes in the UK are very different from a wild countryside fox and would view a riparian area as somewhere to paddle and look for discarded picnic food.  I’m not sure they would survive if they had to really fend for themselves and hunt for all their food.

I think our attitude to wild animals is very different as well.  We don’t really have anything that dangerous here and people freely feed all sorts of creatures from foxes to the red kites that were introduced back into the UK a few years ago.  I’ve never been convinced it was a good idea.  I feed small wild birds with seed, sunflower seeds and the like from specialised feeders.  I have been know to feed hedgehogs in the autumn if I think they look a bit too skinny to hibernate, but that is as far as I go.  I agree with Blewit and MissMP that it tips the balance of nature out by raising the numbers of top predators in the food chain and probably adversely affects other prey animals, as well as annoying humans.

[Marijke Jones]

My veggie garden is at the back of the house and indeed people leave food on the public grass patches which attracts also sea gulls which are an absolute pest.  I will definitely have a go with the bricks. See how that pans out.