Out last night.

Been after one for a few nights now. I mean that in the most relaxed way! Chuck a bit of bait out 100yds from the house, if phone pings before I go to bed then happy days. Otherwise I wake up to a phone full of images the next morning!

It turned up at 8pm tonight and hung around long enough to get the rifle out. Just put it away and about to open the whiskey when the phone pings again!

Number 2 came to see what had happened to its mate (bottom left of image). Didn’t gang around but paused long enough.
 

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I've been out from dusk until 21:30.
I've been playing cat and mouse with that big dog fox. He is good. Keeps patrolling his vixens home. The vixen I got last night wasn't his. I actually watched him wave her off tonight! I nearly got a shot at the vixen.
Try again tomorrow.
Foxing is a funny old game, every now and again you encounter one that seems to be super intelligent/evasive and leads you a merry dance then for some reason, quite unexpectedly it offers an opportunity verging on suicidal. Either that or it’s not “your” nemesis fox of course….
🦊🦊
 
After finding 7 roe in the farmers rape field last weekend , the farmer wants them gone so arrived yesterday afternoon with an hour to go before sunset.
On arrival there was only a mature buck present so watched him hoping the girls would turn up.
Right on dusk 4 does turned up and 3 were taken so not a bad end to 2024.
 
#86 came in right on qué.
I'd only just got into position in the half light. Position meant winding their position in order to get between two properties undetected!
When she came on her usual run it was a rushed affair with an overgrown fence line now in the way. No time for recording this time. 127 yards. Fortunately she stopped and the trigger broke seamlessly.
The dog never showed but kept barking periodically so I made the decision to get back to the car and drive to the other farm and come into the wind from high ground.
An hour later I was on the high ground looking down on the vixens new resting place about 1200 yards away only to see the large bloody dog trailing where I had carried the vixen!
So I rushed back to the car and returned to the start point but he had gone.
I waited for over and hour but he never returned. I did see him in the distance but I got cold and tired by now.
18000 steps I've done today, I don't know why I can't lose weight!
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Out tonight on a permission after a fox that had gotten into chicken pen and killed all but 6.

I was on one side of valley - tried caller all to no avail - scanned round with thermal and clocked a fox coming down other side - it was 250m away and no shot from where I was so tried to move into a better position- 🦊 clocked me at 120m and was off - didn’t even look back before it disappeared over top of valley 🤦‍♂️
 
I've had a few recently, they all seem to be paired up nicely.
Had a dog last night in the turnip field at the bottom of the garden, that field has been productive this year again, just the right amount of cover for them and its firm footing, the turnips got drilled straight into the stubble, and there are sheep in the next field, that always seems to draw them.

Tonight I had a wander around the little shoot (Big Brother told me we had visitors) I spotted a pair fairly quickly by a muck heap and a cover strip, squeaked one in with the mouse call and shot that at 90, turns out it was the vixen, then I tried catching up with the other one but never managed it, spotted it once briefly at 200 but I was getting a battering with the wind so too far for me, tried to use my field craft skills to outwit the wretched beast, but to no avail... that'll be something to do with the missus on New Years eve.. have a ride out in the Gator around the farm :rofl:.

I did spot 5 different Chinks, and a group of 20 Reds, plus the usual Roe & Muntjac, so a nice evening..

Here's the unlucky Lady...
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So after a few hours sleep I'm out again just after 05:00.
I went to check that vixen in her resting place in case the dog was hanging around.
Nothing. I'm use to seeing him but not this morning so I head back to check the lea side of the hill seeing as the wind is increasing. From a vantage point I can scan in excess of a 1000yds and something gets my attention so I go to check but alas all I see are sheep and hare's.
As light starts to approach I head for home.
I take one last look back and get a fox just inside a wood side around a well known earth.
Bugger, so I go back from where I just been once staying above it. As I get to where I can negotiate a gate into the field it becomes apparent it's a dog and vixen and now are in the field playing together.
I get over the gate and am 200yds away but there is a strong wind so close the gap but they go back in the wood and are surveying the earth. I nearly get a shot but they won't keep still. I'm only 130yds away and in danger of getting spotted.
I lose all sight so retreat, it's getting light.
I cover 200 yds and look back.
The big dog is coming along a path I made just inside the wood so I quickly close the gap. At 130 yds I'm tracking him in the wood. I lose him. I find him in the spotter, get the rifle him and he is looking straight at my silhouette!
Then he was gone.
This lad is running rings around me.
He deserves to live!
18000 bastid thousand steps I did yesterday and I've already done 7500 today at 08:45!
Bloody foxes.
 
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