What does the Fox say?

By Sophie Atkinson

Youth Action Officer

We’ve all heard it, the blood-curdling scream in the dead of night that sounds like a sound effect from a horror film. Except it’s not coming from your TV, it’s coming from your back garden…

Although these screams can make us jump out of our skins and send chills down our spines, they are not screams of pain or distress, but rather of randy Foxes out to find a mate. The males and females both vocalise during winter to signal they are ready to mate, and the females will also vocalise during mating. Aside from this very noisy period of the Fox life cycle, they are remarkably quiet animals.

If you’re lucky, you may catch mated pairs of Foxes grooming one another whilst the vixen is pregnant.

About seven to eight weeks after all the screaming, Fox parents will welcome cubs into the world that are deaf, blind, and unable to regulate their body temperature. Yet in just four short weeks, they emerge from the den ready to learn what it means to be a Fox.

The cubs will play with their littermates or any fun object they can find lying around (this little one found a particularly nice rock to take home).

Cub collecting a rock

I’ve had the pleasure of watching seven Fox cubs grow up in the garden below my balcony, and I challenge you not be enthralled by their cuteness when you watch them. I’ve decided I’ll take the terrifying screams if it results in new little bundles of fluff running around.