Are foxes raising cubs in your backyard? Check these photos!
By Gary Bogue
Monday, June 9th, 2008 at 9:19 am in Foxes, Gray foxes, Red foxes.
Seems like every spring I get more and more reports that red foxes and gray foxes are making their dens under our back decks, or digging them under our garden sheds and raising their kits in our backyards.
Is that true? Do you have “company” in your backyard?
I think it’s time for one of my impromptu little surveys to find out that’s going on.
Please take a moment to answer these questions (below), either under “comments” or “reply” below, or send me an e-mail to gbogue@bayareanewsgroup.com
Thanks! I’ll print the results here in my blog and in my column.
QUICK SURVEY:
1. Are foxes denning and raising their cubs in your yard? Where did they put the den?
2. What kind of foxes, red foxes or gray foxes?
3. How many babies?
4. Anything interesting to report?
5. Please list your name, nearest cross streets to your house, city, and a phone number in case I have any questions.
Thanks for helping. As I said, this shouldn’t take you more than two minutes. I appreciate it. /Gary
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June 10th, 2008 at 12:28 pm
I live in Pittsburg near Los Medanos College and I caught a grey fox crossing the street near my home about 5:00 am this morning.
June 12th, 2008 at 8:41 am
I only wish I had foxes in my backyard! How cool! This person is very lucky. By the way, if anyone has issues with wildlife under their house, etc - don’t call a pest control company!!! Call your local wildlife center. WildCare in Marin even has a “wildlife solutions service” now that creates humane solutions for wildife conflicts: http://www.wildcarebayarea.org. I am very proud to be a volunteer of WildCare!
June 13th, 2008 at 12:31 pm
I have a cat out on-leash only in the back yard. Last evening he was 10 feet from a fox in the yard. They were eyeballing each other pretty good. I’ve cleaned up scat on my patio up close to the house. The foxes also use the fence as a super-highway along with squirrels, cats who need to get somewhere fast. We are about 4 short blocks from the Mount Diablo foothills. Would they harm an ‘indoor’ cat out on leash? He is not 5 years old and not declawed. I’m also concerned for my 1-year-old granddaughter that loves to play outside in the early evening (under our watchful eye, of course). Is there any way to discourage their visits?
June 14th, 2008 at 10:08 pm
I once saw a fox play with a feral cat in a field in Walnut Creek a few blocks from Lime Ridge. At first I wondered why the fox was so playful when both were obviously hunting for the same food — field mice. Maybe it was just a young fox? I don’t think that the cat wanted to play.
June 25th, 2008 at 9:47 am
Hello Gary,
We live in Concord near the foothills at the Kaiser Quarry area. We hav 4 foxes that seem to have adopted our yard to live in. We have seen them go under our deck and come out with a squirll. They are very tame. I can get quite close to them. Animal Services suggested we call the Dept of Agriculture. Have not heard back from them yet.
Tom
July 13th, 2008 at 7:10 pm
we have about 6 or 8 gray fox living under our deck in Lafayette. I hope they will not harm my feral cat.
August 5th, 2008 at 10:45 am
We have a family of the grey foxes here. They had the babies next door under the deck. I am surprized at how unconcerned they are when they see us. The babies are so cute. What a treat to see them. I worry about our 8 pound fearless dog tho. No free wandering the yard for now. We live in crockett, it’s woodsy here, but we are not at an “edge” of town.
September 7th, 2008 at 9:31 am
Is there anything I should do about suspected den under our deck? There is considerable activity during the night.
September 7th, 2008 at 9:38 am
marin oaks drive and country club dr, novato, ca
Anything we should do about suspected fox den under our deck?
October 10th, 2008 at 11:30 am
i have a grey fox kit as a pet, i got her when she was about two days old in Brownwood TX. as of right now she is 5 months old and is unique in every way
November 8th, 2008 at 3:29 pm
I had a very exciting experience one night in the past week. I have lived in the area between Highway 24 and the Lafayette Orinda Presbyterian Church for close to forty years. I was getting ready for bed, and I saw our motion sensitive light come on, (it never bothers the raccoons, who just use it to see what they are eating out of our fish pond). I looked out and saw, not five feet from me, clearly visible from the aforesaid light and the full moon, a gray fox. I have seen red foxes periodically in the area, mostly around the Tahos Road/Highway 24 intersections. This was definitively not a red fox. My husband, who didn’t get to see it, thought it might be a coyote. I described very throughly what I saw. It was a moderate sized canine, with grayish fur, bushy tail, black tipped, some kind of stripe from the back of the head to the tail. Having only read about gray foxes, and recognizing red foxes from when I grew up in a rural area of Michigan in the summers, I knew it wasn’t a red fox or a coyote.
I grabbed the California Natural History field guide from the bookcase and opened it to foxes, and lo and behold there it was identified as a gray fox. I may never see another one in the years I have left on this earth, but I will never forget this one.
Have you ever heard of a gray fox in this area. We do back up to a creek.