Hi All,

I see foxes often enough that I don’t usually think much of encounters. Yesterday whilst running a field trip for university students on the Mornington Peninsula, Vic. we had a very up close and personal encounter worth a mention.

Mid-afternoon in bright sunny conditions, whilst a ranger was talking to our group about park management, a fox appeared a little way off with a blackbird in its mouth. What a bonus given the project focused on invasive species! It stood and watched our group of 50 odd people for a minute or so before wandering off into the bush.

A few moments later it re-appeared (without the blackbird). Our group’s focus shifted to the fox and it proceeded to walk deliberately down the track towards us. I was carrying gardening gloves and on waving one of these just a little, it appeared particularly interested, so I tossed the glove (old & ripped) on the ground. Much to the amusement of all, the fox ran in to within ~5 meters of us, picked up the glove and scampered off.

Not long after, it again returned (without the glove) and trotted along behind us as we moved about 200 m down the path. Here we stopped to hand pull invasive weeds whilst the fox wandered around the periphery. By the end, I was on the ground taking photos, whilst it trotted in and out inspecting, collecting and chewing sticks that were tossed to it as if it were a bored dog! It seemed remarkably relaxed, approaching to within a meter on a number of occasions and even sitting down and yawning within 3 meters.

Although I have heard of hand-tame foxes I’ve never actually seen a Red Fox behave like this.  It wasn’t a big animal but appeared to be a reasonably healthy vixen with a nice coat. As the ranger watched all of this with interest I doubt it will be around for long!

A few of the better pics can be found here...

http://www.pbase.com/wildlifeimages/red_fox

(The first 14 images in the gallery - all of which were taken with a 28-105 mm lens).

Cheers,

Rohan