tamaranth | Fox in a Box, on the way to wildlife hospital

Fox in a Box, on the way to wildlife hos
Originally uploaded by tamaranth.

ladymoonray came over for dinner and pink drink last night (it is, coincidentally, five years this weekend since we first met) and after a tiring evening of eating and drinking we'd planned a leisurely Saturday. But when I woke up there was a fox cub on the verandah ...

S/he was very young, and in shock, and didn't respond to food or water or my presence. Lovely long black hairs scattered through the russet fur. Green-gold eyes. Pretty much paralysed: when I first found the cub, its back legs were splayed at an unnatural angle, and I wondered if it had broken its back. We couldn't just leave him there to die.

So we boxed the fox and drove to Leatherhead, to the wildlife hospital at Randalls Farm. I'm glad such a place exists.

Just phoned to find out how our patient was. They put it to sleep: it'd been poisoned and wasn't going to make it.

Worrying that cats will find whatever foxcub found. Though it was such a young cub that surely it wouldn't have gone after solid food?

And wondering if it crawled all the way onto the verandah because of the water-bowl / birdbath there ... or whether there's something in this garden that poisoned it.

RIP little fox. I've never held a live fox before. At least we shortened its suffering.