Fox Attack On Twin Girls

[saggyhairyarse]

I just read this on the 'Latest News' on BBC News but when I clicked on the headline there was no info.

I am shocked and hoping they are not seriously hurt.

Far more children are injured by dogs than by foxes and no-one is talking about reducing the population of dogs. This is an horrific attack, but who can remember any other fox attack on humans?

Mind you, one of the neighbours was on the radio this morning admitting she'd been feeding the foxes - apparently throwing chicken wings out of the window of her first floor flat. Strikes me as a bit dim. I like watching our local foxes when I occasionally see them, but I wouldn't throw ruddy chicken wings at them!

x-posts kitty

(Btw, agree weekly bin collections would help. But you'll never get that past the recycling enthusiasts and councils who enjoy ordering their residents around and can make hidden cuts by reducing collections.)

I'm sure plenty of people would love to see more restrictions on dog ownership to help cut dog attacks.

No wonder this fox was searching for food, the smell of the BBQ, being fed chicken legs.

Urban foxes in high numbers is a relatively new phenomenon and obviously education is needed.

Surely it isn't so much that foxes are being attracted into the cities from the countryside, like Dick Whittington looking for a better life. It is just that the ones who are in the cities are doing very well indeed on human surpluses etc.

There is no shortage of foxes in my ruralish area. But they have space and no incentive to risk entry into gardens/houses.

You're probably right edam - in Belgium towns we have fortnightly recycling collections but general rubbish and food rubbish is collected weekly. Taxes are high to help pay for this; and the special bin bags we have to use are also expensive.

We also have efficient street cleaners, again paid for by high taxation.

Erm, Ryoko, it has been so hot in South London, especially on Saturday. I have had all the doors and windows open. And even then the temp inside my baby's room was 29-30C consistently. They were being good parents trying to keep their babies at a safe temperature.
I hope they'll recover quickly.

I know what the temperature was I live in a 3rd floor flat in London, I bought a fan and open the windows in the room my son is in and strip him down, give him a drink of cold water every few hours etc , I don't see how leaving the ground floor door open helps kids who are upstiars, its just as hot outside as it is inside and there isn't much of a breeze lately.

And just how do people propose we cull foxes in urban areas?

Poison which presents risk to cats/dogs/other domestic animals? traps which are barbaric? Shooting not an option in urban areas because of the close proximity to people.

The real answer is that we need to stop providing the foxes with a food source and let nature take its course.

In the wild animals will only live on the food available, and when there is not enough food the weaker animals die. that's nature, except man has interfeered with nature to the extent that there is now enough food that the weaker animals survive and the population gets out of control.

Cut off the food sources and the population will be controlled naturally.

And one attack is not grounds to cull urban foxes - typical knee-jerk reaction.

Yes quite, eleison. Round here they have as much kfc as they can eat and no fast car peril.

Thing is belgo, weekly rubbish collections used to be the norm here. So I don't see why they should be more expensive. They happened when council tax was lower! And while I think about it, council tax is pretty high and has been going up hugely every year - far more steeply than other taxes bar the sin taxes on things such as smoking.

Of course, if they were re-introduced, I'm sure councils would use them as an excuse to put up local taxes...

I'm sure they would edam!

Just to be clear, I didn't suggest that rural hunting was the cause of the urban fox problem...my point was rather that it was a bit irrelevant, but hardly likely to encourage foxes to leave urban areas if it was going to go one way or another.

I just think has very little to do with it.

I quite like the thought of a urban foxhunt, though. Hunting-pink hoodies worn by people on motorbikes followed by hordes of status Pit Bulls.

it probably is the attractiveness of urban food sources that are causing the urban fox population to increase, rather then factors pushing them out of the countryside.

Elieson

Ellieson. How long before cries of 'viewhalloo' becomes regarded as chavvy? Or Elizabeth Duke starts doing stirrup cups?

I love foxes.

IMO it is crueller (on all those DCs at risk of being harmed by parents or by their parents' neglect) to take extraordinarily unusual - freakish even - explanations for injuries at face value. I don't think anyone here should feel ashamed for expressing scepticism.

FWIW I do believe the parents - despite the lack of hard evidence at the time of writing. Catching a random fox in a trap is not evidence - had the family claimed their poor DCs were attacked by something rare and that had been caught then it would serve far better as evidence.

But like I said, I believe these parents. But I won't apologise for my initial scepticism and I don't think anyone else should, either. I am quite sure that the parents are intelligent enough to understand that on first hearing, their story sounds suspicious.

I like foxes too. But if they are becoming a problem in urban areas then we need to do something about them. And it's our fault they are a problem; and the foxes shouldn't have to suffer a cull because of this.

Catching a random fox in a trap is not evidence - sorry I worded that badly. It is evidence that maybe a fox attacked the babies as they are active in the area. But it doesn't really proove that this is what happened.

All of which is irrelevant now as I think we're alll agreed that the parents are telling the truth.

Shooting a random fox caught in a trap makes no sense. That fox wasn't necessarily the one who attacked the babies. But killing it probably makes the tabloids feel better...

no it's not definitive evidence, but if foxes are territorial animals, and hunt in the same places every night, then I understand why they set the trap to catch the fox that was found at the house the next night.

TheBoy - the girls' mother saw the fox in their bedroom. See here.

No culling, stop being stupid how many foxes are there in London, just cos one bit a couple of kids you want to wipe em all out thats stupid.

you want less foxes, rats etc in london, stop being dirty, put waste in properly covered bins and stop chucking things on the floor. Tackle the cause not the result.

Half the mess in West London at least, rubbish chucked out of bin bags, bags pulled out of bins etc is caused by Magpies and crows anyway, I find it very impressive that Magpies have learned to recognise fast food boxes and bags so all ways go for them first, shows a high level of intelligence IMO.

We have fortnightly rubbish collections. But weekly recycling and foodwaste collections! There is no need to put food in your dustbin. Foxes aren't interested in the kind of waste that should go in wheelie bins.

Foxes are opportunists as are all animals that have to rely on their wits. We make it so easy for them to live as opportunists in towns and so hard for them to live in rural aareas. Stop leaving bins full of food and litter in town and stop developing massive swathes of the country so more and more wild animals have nowhere to go.

We make our own 'vermin'.