Rewind 30 years and an urban fox was a bit of rarity. When I was a kid, foxes were still almost mythical – a reddy-orange beast with a tail called a brush, known more for their appearance in Roald Dahl’s Fantastic Mr Fox or on TV with Mr Roy than in our back gardens.
Fast forward to the early 21st century and if you don’t see a fox at least once a month, you’re obviously walking around with your eyes closed. They’re everywhere.
None more so than late at night when they indulge in a spot of recreational behaviour – mating. If you type ‘mating foxes‘ into Google, there are more than 500 different results, including videos (hmm!) and the mating call.
Ahh, the mating call – now that’s something we’re far too well-acquainted with since moving to the coast. At least once a week, we’re woken at around 1.30am with the call of the wild.
It’s a sort of screech, a high-pitched yowl that lasts upwards of 10 minutes. The windows get shut, but can’t completely drown out the yelping that must wake up the entire neighbourhood and not just our bedroom.
I’ve a good mind to dig out my 12-bore like Boggis and Bunce in the aforementioned FMF, but that would wake me up even more.
As it is, I’ll have to make do with pulling the pillow over my head and hoping I can drift off and ignore the local vulpine nocturnal activities.
