Xref: kermit uk.rec.gardening:172423


Yes our urban fox is a very sweet creature BUT NOT IN MY GARDEN
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Nor mine.

We've lost several hens to them. They didn't eat the hens, just killed them.
In the daytime. Always.


Its getting to the point where I wait by the back door and chase them off
when I see them , but one cant do that all night. They are even getting
cheeky enough to just casually walk off now when I shout at them , where as
they use to scarper at first.

Yes. They also come during the day, or when we're in the garden, and look
indignantly at us if we dare to walk towards them.


Why me !!!!!!!!!!!!

It's not just you.

Any thoughts , is it just my garden they like or do they trash everyones
??????

They didn't trash our garden but they caused a LOT of unhappiness. Our hens
are as precious to us as some people's dogs and cats are to them.

Any help would be useful but I have tried all the normal stuff. It needs
to be "RADICAL" I feel.

Renardine does work but you have to apply it very frequently and it becomes
expensive.

Man-made deterrent simply didn't work for us, despite everyone's claim that
it does.

The most prickly hedging was sneered at, thick fur coats is impervious to
hawthorn, berberis, holly, pyracantha and anything else you can name.
Believe me, we tried it all.

Because we're in the inner city we can't shoot them or call in the hunt. A
'humane' trap would only move the problem somewhere else.

Barbed wire along the tops of fencing was disdained.

Loose chicken netting along the top of fencing, might work, we never saw a
fox scale that. The idea is that even if they jump up to it the netting
won't hold their weight so they don't persist.

We had to make a high fence (two metres) of chain link supported by a steel
framework, which they couldn't scale. But neighbours' wooden fences with 3"
wide wooden cappings made it easy for these apparently circus-trained
acrobats to walk along and hop over our fence at the corner.

The answer was to weld thin upright steel rods, 3" apart, along the top of
the steel fence framework. They're about 18" high and to date (fingers
crossed) have done the dibs. We haven't had a hen killed in months. In fact
the foxes seem to have given up trying, we haven't seen one for ages.

The problem is that some neighbours like to see fox in their gardens and
encourage them. In some places - not ours - fox are attracted by dustbins
because of all the food which is discarded. Not only do we discard food but
our bins are fox-proof. But the myth that fox are fluffy wuffy nice ickle
animals persist among those who don't suffer from them.

Apart from a mechanical deterrent I can't help you - but I sympathise ...

Mary

Cheers
Chris