to try and get rid of the fuckity fuck fucking foxes? HELP!

[Graze22]

Live on a slightly scabby street where people don't care much about their bins, overload them and don't have lids on etc. There is also a Chinese restaurant over the road so there is a huge industrial bin full of food on our road. A few nights a week the foxes come and have a party. They screech that hideous bloody screech around midnight and onwards fighting each other I assume. Last night there were about six of them. This morning the pavements were strewn with rubbish, next doors nappies everywhere and old food.

They are totally unafraid of me when I go out and shout pathetically to try and scare them off. One followed me home after an evening out the other day, sauntering along like he was bloody cock of the walk. He was clearly saying 'look lady, I own this town and you better get bloody used to it cos I aint going anywhere'. They are all over the streets at night and don't seem to give a flying fuck about people. Don't cower or hide in the shadows or anything like that.

I HATE them and think they are disgusting horrible vermin and am desperate for them to stop waking me up at night. And the screeches terrify my toddler who thinks they are monsters coming to get him.

What can I do other than write to the council to beg them to do something about the bins? Should I buy a rifle?

A fox came all the way upstairs to my bedroom once (third floor!) I was having an old lady siesta with the cat. Brave cat chased it downstairs, out into the garden, over the fence and away ... puss is my hero! Mind you, when she was faced with a big rat in my kitchen, cat ran away and left me to it ... rat just looked at me then nonchalently wandered over to cat's dish and started eating.

The noise you hear is probably the beasts mating.

Why have I never heard of Loius CK before? Suddenly I'm seeing him everywhere and he's great!

Why not just keep the bin area in your bit clean and well managed?

The noises are alarming, I have to say, but its not every 5 minutes.

Super squirter to fend off lairy ones, council to sort rubbish.

Mens pee, get those skanky neighbours to have a wee around their bins on the way back from the chippy.

Seriously though ring EH & lay it on thick, say you've seen rats as well.

Maybe the council needs to supply more bins /extra emptying round there?

Fox screeches are horrible. They are loud and very unsettling.

I agree with the poster who suggested taking lots of photos. The other thing that would help is if you could get a few of your nieghbours to complain too. You could just get them to sign a mini petition/group letter. It doesn't gave yo be anything major but a joint complaint will be given a lot more weight.

Make sure you stick to the facts in your letter. The council probably won't do anything about the foxes themselves but they should do something about the rubbish.

ThatBloodyWoman obviously I keep my bins clean and well managed! It would be pretty rich for me to be complaining if I had my rubbish all over the street as well!

PS Louis CK is the greatest. All his stand up is on youtube watch it ALL

I'd agree with the others here saying it's the bins that need dealing with, not the foxes. If you get rid of one set of foxes without addressing the original problem, then all you do is create a job vacancy for the next lot of foxes. That, and at the moment you have to choose between foxes and rats.

Take photos, lots of photos of the bins, and send them to the local paper if the council won't pay attention.

Good luck getting a response from the council. Where I used to live we were near to 3 fried chicken shops, which are basically little foxy crack-dens, because as well as all the delicious rubbish sacks, humans chuck the bones on the pavement as they eat the chicken while leaning drunkenly on the bus stop. Cue massive fox problem, walking home at night was like some sort of zombie film with foxes.

I contacted the council after they ate our NDN's guinea pigs, and then opened the nest box and killed our chickens. We had turn bolts on the nest box but apparently the foxes round our way have evolved opposable thumbs. (We now have padlocks, and the chickens are safe until one of the foxes burgles the house and nicks our keys.)

The council wrote back to say we should be grateful to see majestic animals in their natural habitat, the smug fuckers.

Sounds like your problem is more the people around you than the foxes Graze.

We have a similar problem where I live except it's gulls not foxes so much.

We have large communal bins in the street and people will just dump their rubbish beside them instead of opening them and putting the rubbish inside.

When I put my rubbish in one yesterday they had clearly just been emptied but some idiot had left a couple of bags beside the bin and the bloody gulls had already dragged the rubbish all over the road; our gulls are like your foxes and don't give a damn about people trying to shoo them off. They're very aggressive and a bit scary. And they are HUGE.

The bin men are very good about picking up rubbish in the street as it a constant problem here and in all fairness the council does try to keep on top of it.

You could try contacting your council, but tbh I wouldn't hold out much hope as I can't see what they can do about selfish inconsiderate people leaving their rubbish all over the place.

Foxes in towns are a right nightmare. A friend of mine who lives in a city asked me to bring my gun over and shoot a couple that keep appearing in his garden.... I told him the police might take a dim view of me letting off a high velocity rifle in a suburban back yard!
Best phone the council, but in the meantime just be as careful as you can. Double bag any food waste, don't leave the dog bowl down after your dog has finished his dinner, make sure lids of bins are closed, if your bin gets smelly / full then consider a tip run before the binmen come to avoid it sitting out too long.