What happens when you hire a professional fox controller?

A recent radio interview (below) on BBC Radio London featured a professional fox controller. He makes his living shooting foxes in urban areas, mainly in people’s back gardens.

As he made clear in the interview, foxes are protected under a variety of animal cruelty acts, however they are not afforded special protection, as Badgers are, for example.

This means that is perfectly legal to employ someone to come to your home and shoot a nuisance fox, as long as they have the appropriate firearms licences and carry out the killing in accordance with animal cruelty laws.

At first glance, this may seem like a very simple solution to the fox problems you’ve been experiencing at home.

Make a phone call. Bang! Job done. No more fox.

Sounds simple, right?

Well, it is and it isn’t.

The reality of having a fox shot

It’s true that shooting a fox (or foxes) will rid your garden of the fox instantly and the fox controller will even take away the body for you, so you don’t have to deal with the clean up operation afterwards.

However, if you listen to the interview, you’ll hear the reality of what happens when you get someone in to remove a fox by lethal means.

• A .22 Rimfire Rifle will be brought into your home.
• A upstairs bedroom will need to be taken over after dark for at least a couple of hours.
• A ‘clean kill’ will be attempted, whereby the fox is shot once in the head.
• The dead fox will be taken away and either burnt on a bonfire or buried.
• Not mentioned in the interview is the fact this service can cost up to £350.

The description of what happens when a fox controller comes to your home starts at 3m 22s:

While I don’t agree with lethal means to remove foxes, this is certainly not intended as an attack on professional fox controllers.

I’m sure many provide a very professional service and operate well within the law. It’s merely an observation of what you can expect to happen should you employ their services.

Other foxes will still be interested in your garden

Another important point mentioned in the interview is the issue of what happens once the neighbouring foxes realise that your garden is no longer occupied by the previous fox?

Will they respect the memory of the previous fox and allow it’s territory to remain vacant?

Definitely not. They’ll be battling it out amongst themselves, by pooing, urinating and fighting, in order to claim a lovely new living space.

Your particular problem fox may be gone, but the professional fox controller will still recommend that you ‘fox-proof’ your garden by using a recognised fox deterrent in order to prevent another fox from moving in.

Using a humane fox deterrent instead

If you’re comfortable with what will happen when a fox controller comes to your home to deal with the fox and you’re happy with the cost, then by all means go ahead and give one a call.

However, I imagine that a lot of you will not be comfortable with what you’ve heard/read and will be much more interested in finding a humane and non-lethal way of deterring foxes from your garden.

Deterring foxes humanely is absolutely possible with a little bit of persistence. You’ll also have the satisfaction of knowing that you’re not responsible for the death of an innocent animal or having spent hundreds of pounds to achieve it.

There are several things you can do to make your garden less attractive to foxes, but the most important thing is to locate where the fox enters your garden.

Foxes are creatures of habit and usually come in at the same point. So that is the best place to target with a fox deterrent, putting the fox off your garden as soon as it tries to enter.

The FoxWatch Ultrasonic Deterrent

One of the best ways to do this is by using the FoxWatch Ultrasonic Fox Deterrent.

The FoxWatch is a small unit that lets out blasts of high-pitched noise every time a fox crosses it’s infrared motion sensor. The 40 – 45kHz noise is too high for humans to hear, but is at a pitch that provides a great irritation to foxes.

By placing the FoxWatch facing the area the fox comes into your garden, any fox will immediately set off this ‘fox burglar alarm’ as soon as it tries to enter.

Over a short amount of time, the fox effectively changes it’s behaviour, learning to associate your garden with the noise, reducing it’s visits before stopping coming in completely.

The best thing about the FoxWatch is that it acts as a constant deterrent, deterring foxes 24 hours a day, whether you’re in or out. It doesn’t require you to be constantly monitoring it as you would if you used a spray or scented deterrent, which naturally gets weaker over time or after heavy rainfall.

The FoxWatch is designed to sit outside, proving the persistence needed to successfully deter foxes without you needing to get involved – particularly useful if you’re out at work all day and your garden unattended.

Simple to set up, the FoxWatch can be powered by mains adapter or a 9 Volt Duracell battery and acts as an effective, humane and low maintenance fox deterrent, without the guilt or high cost associated with getting in someone with a rifle.