Fox Repellent Expert Podcast

Benjamin from the Fox Repellent Expert website shares tips, advice and information on urban foxes and how to humanely deter them, so you can protect your garden from their damage and destruction. Discover how foxes view your garden and understand what deterrent and repellent tools you can use to minimise their pooing, digging, chewing and all the other common fox problems. Benjamin has been running Fox Repellent Expert since 2010, when he first experienced the frustrations of urban foxes after moving to Croydon in South London, and discovered there was a lack of quality fox deterrent information online. The site has continually evolved and is on it's way to becoming the Number 1 resource for information on humane fox deterrence in the UK. If you are from Europe, North America or anywhere else in the world with a large fox population, you are also very welcome and will find much of the content useful. It's important to remember that foxes are not the enemy, nor do they do anything to deliberately spite you. They thrive in our towns and cities because our lifestyles provide them with the means to do so. That being said, they are often a nuisance and this podcast will equip you with the knowledge to reduce their negative impact, enabling you to live harmoniously with these fascinating creatures, while also taking back control of your garden. Welcome, enjoy and please subscribe!

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Fox Repellent Expert Podcast

016 - April: Den to discovery

April 30, 2024 • Benjamin Clarke • Episode 16

The fourth of the series exploring what foxes are up to in each month of the year. A vulpine calendar of events, if you will.

APRIL - The fox cubs grow and develop quickly in their first month, which allows the vixen to finally leave them for short periods and venture out of the den. The cubs will also start making short trips out around the entrance to the den, but the vixen will be very protective as they're still very vulnerable. Why should you keep your pet cats and dogs away and why are the cubs described as 'month-old thugs'?

Listen to this episode to hear about what's going on in April in the world of urban foxes and see if it relates to what you've been observing in your garden this month.

Links mentioned in this episode:

Red Fox: The Catlike Canine by J. David Henry [affiliate link]
National Gardening Week

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Hello this is Ben from the Fox Repellent Expert website and welcome to the latest episode of this podcast.

This episode is the fourth in this series where I’m looking at what foxes are up to during each month of the year. This time I’m looking at April and I hope it will give you some insight into what’s going on with your local foxes and help you to understand their behaviour.

April is a month that sees the fox cubs transition from helpless newborns into something more recognisable, as they grow quite quickly. After the first two weeks, the cubs will be less reliant on the vixen for body heat as their juvenile fur has grown thicker and they’re more adept at regulating their own body temperature.

This frees up the vixen who will have been almost entirely in the den since just before the cubs were born. She’ll start to make short trips out into the real world, catching prey for herself and bringing back small morsels of food for the cubs to test out their newly-developing teeth. The vixen will still be performing motherly duties though, grooming the cubs and cleaning up,and sometimes even eating, their faecal matter. Sounds disgusting but it keeps the den clean and possibly provides the vixen with important nutrients.

At about a month old, the cubs start making excursions out of the den at so you might start seeing them, though they won’t venture too far as they’ll struggle with orientation. I’m just going to read a short excerpt from the excellent book, Red Fox: The Catlike Canine by Canadian ecologist J David Henry, in which he talks amusingly about these early forays away from the den:

“During this stage, the fox kits are far from fully coordinated and have been above ground for only short periods. Yet at about 25 days of age, the kits begin to fight viciously. They clash with each other in short, serious, and sometimes fatal contests (although fatalities are rare.) Fox kits do not act like cute cuddly puppies, such as those of the domestic dog; rather they have always seemed to me to have a slightly demonic character. They are tough month-old thugs, little street fighters who initiate fights and establish a strict dominance hierarchy during the following ten days.”

That was from the Red Fox: The Catlike Canine, by J David Henry. It’s a really interesting read, as it recounts the adventures of the author studying foxes in a Canadian National Park. I’ll put a link in the show notes if you want to read more.

So while the cubs are developed enough to start scrapping with each other, it’s important to keep in mind that they’re still quite vulnerable. Rival foxes, badgers and even stoats can be a threat to young fox cubs, so the vixen will be on high alert and very protective.

For this reason, if you do see fox cubs in your garden then it’s important to do what you can to keep any pet cats or dogs away from them. An inquisitive pet can be deemed a threat to the cubs by the vixen if they get too close and, while it’s very unlikely she’d actually launch a full-scale attack, the vixen may feel threatened enough to carry out what’s known as a bluff-charge.

A bluff-charge is a tactic used by some animals, such as foxes and bears, to intimidate and act as a warning, but without actually following through with violence. A threatened vixen may take a few intimidating steps towards a dog or cat just to get them to back off and hopefully they’ll get the message. Fox attacks on pet dogs and cats are very rare, but just for your own peace of mind, try and keep your pets away wherever possible.

So that’s April in the world of a fox - as we’ve seen it’s a time of great change and development for the cubs. They start spending time away from the den, they establish a hierarchy between themselves and start stealing food from each other, but they’re also still very much reliant on the vixen, the dog fox and any helper foxes for receiving food and supervision

In the next episode I’ll look at May where the cubs rapidly continue to develop and the whole family should be much more visible in your garden and local area.

On a slightly different note, the 29th April saw the beginning of National Gardening Week in the UK, which is a campaign run by the Royal Horticultural Society to inspire people to get out in their gardens and do something greenfingered. In honour of National Gardening Week, I put on my gardening gloves, got out my kneeling-pad and pulled out the weeds that had grown in between the paving slabs on my little patio.

I also washed my clay terracotta pots that I use to grow various herbs and plants. They’d gone green over the winter and looked a bit neglected, so I wiped them down and returned them to their original colour and former glory. It wasn’t a huge undertaking, but as with all gardening jobs, it took longer than I thought. I enjoyed it though and found it very therapeutic - my little patio looked much smarter and more welcoming as a result. National Gardening Week has been run by the RHS since 2012, usually in the last week of April or first week of May, so next time its on, why not get out in your garden and see what needs doing!

Well, that’s it for this episode of the Fox Repellent Expert podcast. I hope it’s been insightful and informative, regarding some of the fox activity in your area at this time of year. I’ll put any links mentioned in this episode in the show notes.

If you found today’s episode interesting, you can subscribe to the Fox Repellent Expert podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Please feel free to leave a review as it helps other people find the show.

Thank you very much for listening and I’ll see you next time.