Fox News

I have been puzzling over what is going on with the foxes in the garden.  Last year was fairly straightforward as the four foxes in the family were easily individually recognisable.  The dog had a torn right ear and a tapered muzzle and a bright white tip to his tail.  The vixen seemed to have shorter legs and a deeper body, so was a very different shape, and had a pale broad muzzle.  One cub had only half a tail (easily recognised!) and the other had a very small grey tip to the tail.  Here are the four last autumn - dog, vixen, full-tailed and half-tailed cubs, clockwise from top left.

Both cubs have stayed through the winter so I presumed both were female because male cubs usually disperse in their first winter.  Both were here in the snow in February.   I have seen the resident vixen from time to time, so she is still around but I haven't seen the dog fox since the turn of the year, nor have I seen another dog fox.  The two foxes I have been seeing regularly in the last few weeks are last year's cubs, now full grown.  And intriguingly the half-tail now appears to be feeding young.  Here she is this week.

And here is the other one I presume to be her sister.

When the two are here together half-tail is the submissive one.  Here she is waiting patiently about 20m away while her sister feeds.  The camera can just about cope with the very low light.

I was puzzled that the full-tail was dominant, even though the half-tail has young (normally a breeding vixen will be dominant and non-breeders will be subordinate).  Then the next night last year's vixen turned up first and she clearly is feeding cubs.

A few minutes later her full-tailed daughter turned up and joined her.  Here are the two of them.

Here is the daughter.

In the past week or so a fox has appeared within a minute or two of me putting the food out.  I think this means the first fox is waiting in the lane and watching until I come back in before dashing in to be the first at the food.  For the past three days it has been last year's mother.

I have rewritten this post half a dozen times in the last few days and I am still not quite sure what to make of it all.  As I understand it there won't be two breeding females within the same social group (family) and it is odd for a yearling to breed when her mother is still here.  I think the most likely explanation is that my garden is in the overlap between two territories and that the half-tail has set up next door to her mother and both visit the garden for food.  So far I haven't seen last year's mother and the half-tail in the garden at the same time so I don't know how they would interact. Whatever the explanation, it does seem there is a good chance I shall see cubs in the garden this summer.