Seeing a lot of foxes this year.

[abner13]

Running across the roads (63/73/113/202) , and a few along the side of the road that didn't make it. Red foxes , nice coats , most look pretty healthy too.

[Knightshift]

A month or so ago seeing many kits about too. That's what warm winters lead to. Deer, squirrels, bunnies abound.

[sota]

forget foxes.
rabbits, squirrels, chipmunks, ground hogs... all are at yard critter levels I've NEVER seen!

[Walleye Hunter]

forget foxes.
rabbits, squirrels, chipmunks, ground hogs... all are at yard critter levels I've NEVER seen!

Yep, and don't forget the turkeys. Now where the hell are the pheasants?

[esh21167]

Foxes.jpg

[mrat]

If only all cougars were foxes.

[Gman106]

Overrun with fox down here in SEPA, some aggressive, too. Made a post about it...


https://forum.pafoa.org/showthread.php?t=360900

[sota]

Yep, and don't forget the turkeys. Now where the hell are the pheasants?

haven't seen the wild turkeys yet, but I bet they're coming.
also, birds, of all shapes and sizes. holy hell there's a ton of them. ravens, crows, robins, blue jays, finches, starlings, vultures... especially the vultures!

[bamboomaster]

Must be because of all the ferral cats. Foxes are their natural predators...

Ever since Wolf (and his medical advisor who may have already been fixed, but not a "cat" per-se) shut down PA's economy, there was nowhere to go to get a humanely trapped ferral cat fixed that would agree to legally operate on the - well - reproductive organs at a non-essential life-sustaining enterprise.

Unlike a hospital with ventilators, laid-off physicians, unemployed staff, and such....

Well, this is how government produces surprising results after a round of legislative kool-aid that nobody could see coming. Sort of like a mini black swan event we've had dropped on us.

At the time we were quarrantined, we weren't permitted to leave our homes as a result of the mandated mandates in SE PA...

I suppose we could have fixed some things earlier if we participated in those peaceful Philly demonstrations that came close to burning down the city's economy, but I'm not sure it would have solved the "fox" issue in our neck of the woods to any extent...

Which is why we ended up feeding 8 ferrals today ("Nice kitties - no scratching now"...) and found a new litter (apparently birthed yesterday) of five more in the backyard.

Thanks gov....are you gonna pass a bill for fixing rescued ferrals - for free? If you wait a few more months on this, we may end up humanely supporting 30-40 cats. Which is gonna attract more foxes...

Went to Tractor Supply today (because the economy may get locked down for PHASE II), and picked up three 30 lb bags of Frisky cat food - around $23 each - just to keep the cats from starving for the next few months.

Also saw a fox in the store who flipped up a bag of chicken food over her shoulder then found her way to her safe-distancing place in the check-out line. Had no idea what I was thinking...

The foxes we're familiar with (in addition to a couple of cute dog walkers from outside the neighborhood who routinely slow-walk their pitbulls through ours) live two houses over under the backyard tool shed...apparently, they had a litter of three kits, two-three months ago.

So I think this may be some of what you're seeing.

Turtles also lay their eggs just off the creek in their backyard...

Probably TMI - our alternative food supply could be at risk!

[wanneroo]

Stop feeding those damn feral cats!

We had this guy that started feeding them a number of years ago and all the neighborhood ended up with was 20-30 aggressive feral cats, spreading disease, ticks and fleas, pooping everywhere, killing all the birds that eat the insects, tearing up the trash, howling and fighting all night, etc.

Hopefully PA will get to the point Australia and New Zealand got to and recognize how destructive feral cats are to the ecosystem. It's at a point in both countries where it may be past the point salvage as they kill so many native animals every year, so it is open season on all of them.