Red Foxes Vulpes vulpes vixen grooming a younger vixen
Like 1 Dislike 0 Published on 22 Sep 2018
Red Foxes Vulpes vulpes have developed a well-defined social hierarchy in which the status of each individual is recognised by other foxes. They communicate not just by producing a range of almost 30 recognisable sounds (equating to human words - or perhaps sentences) that are almost exclusively uttered only in the presence of other foxes but with posturing and scent-marking too. The often have noisy and apparently violent confrontations in which two individuals will rear up on their hind-legs, place their forelegs on the opponent's chest and indulge in a screaming match but in most cases this involves minimal or no actual violence and the resolution will simply be a matter of one chasing the other away - and not very far at that. One method of reinforcing social relationships is by grooming although this is often a one-sided affair in which a subordinate animal might present itself in a non-aggressive manner that provides a useful service to the dominant animal by enabling parasites to be removed from those parts of the body that can only be reached by claws (particularly the face). However this film shows a different scenario in which a vixen (previously believed to have been a dog fox until she unexpectedly produced a litter at the age of 4, so the title of this film is now incorrect) is shown grooming the face of a younger vixen. These animals know each other well, there is also a dog fox visiting regularly and often all three animals will turn up together. The younger vixen has been reduced to a state of almost paralytic ecstasy by the gentle grooming of the fur around her ears and mouth and indeed once the older female had walked away she remained completely motionless until I approached her to see if she was all right! The press stories about the 'Croydon Cat Killer' grossly misrepresented the behaviour of these animals so it is even more important that they should be illustrated behaving naturally. Most (if not all) of the cats once forensically examined were proven to have died from blunt-force trauma - i.e. they had been hit by cars with human drivers in them. Therefore the fact that fox DNA had been identified at the 'crime scenes' merely proved that, as opportunistic feeders, they had visited the dead animal and quite possibly dragged edible parts away including the heads as brain tissues are highly nutritious and therefore favoured. This is to be expected. Foxes will certainly utilise any source of carrion including road-kill (and many may die themselves on the roads as a consequence of their attempts to access this food). Carcasses are also utilised by corvids (crows), some raptors and also by invertebrates, all part of the natural process (otherwise there would be dead animals everywhere!) One thing is clear. Although a fox may occasionally be tempted by a small unguarded kitten, the likelihood of one trying to kill a full-grown domestic cat is very small indeed - and it just as likely that fox cubs could be the victims of attacks by cats. Confrontation between adults is usually avoided as the weaponry possessed by a cat would be likely to cause injury to a fox if it approached too closely. There may be isolated examples of sickly or elderly cats being attacked but the couple of 'confrontations' that I have seen during thousands of observations of foxes and cats involved watching a vixen walk along the top of a fence to bypass a cat in her path and once - only once I have seen a vixen chase a cat from a garden, not in pursuit but for territorial reasons. Please make your own observations and don't believe the scare-stories that you read in the papers or on social media!