"Fox Radar"
I had a bit of a problem with a fox early last year, it started coming into my garden pi55ing on the lawn and crapping on the paths, her indoors finally stood on one and that was it, She wanted it gone. Get it sorted - What do you want me to do I said, she said do whatever it is that you do to get rid of it, So that was the green light. Over the next couple of weeks I pondered on how best to catch a fox, after some research I ended up on You-Tube and found a guy that had made a trap from a shopping trolley, as it didn't look too difficult to make I set about finding an old trolley.
Trolley found, courtesy of some very lazy students, a small angle grinder some wire and some plywood for a roof, it didn't take long to knock up, I set it up at the bottom of the garden with my camera overlooking it, hoping to catch some action. I tied a frozen squirrel to the trigger and left another just in the entrance, two nights later I caught the fox.
After the fox was dispatched I had a look at the camera and discovered that there were two foxes so I baited the trap again and waited, but to no avail, the second fox just wouldn't go into the trap.
Over the next couple of weeks I caught the fox on camera many times but it was very irregular sometimes coming in early evening and other times well after midnight or the early hours of the morning, which would make it near impossible to sit up and wait for it. And here was me thinking that foxes were creatures of habit, certainly not this one.
Finally gave up on the trap and decided that I needed a different approach, my garden gets very little ambient light other than when there's a full moon which makes it blacker than darkest Africa and you see diddly squat. What I needed was something that would alert me to the fact that a fox was in the garden well before it got to the bait station so I could get the window open and get the gun to the ready.
What I really needed was "Radar" but where can you buy radar to detect foxes, You can't.
So, a friend of mine is a retired electrician that used to install alarms and he has a basement full of old components and systems that never got thrown away, always good for spare parts he would say.
So with all these spare parts I asked him if it would be possible to use a 12v battery connect a PIR, run a cable up to the house that would be connected to a buzzer or an LED so in effect warning me that there was a fox there without even seeing it - in effect Radar! anything's possible but let me give it some thought he said.
Two hours later he sent me an E-mail with a link to this product 1BYONE Wireless Motion Sensor Doorbelll Chime Detector Entry Alarm Alert Sensor | eBay
Now it's one thing detecting the postman coming up your drive it's another detecting a fox, but I had nothing to lose, so I ordered one, did it work? YES, 100% with the exception of a few false positives that being a neighbours moggy, I disregarded all the silly tunes and went for the "door knock" sound, it's a bit easier on the ears, I set the PIR about 18" of the ground and it gives really good coverage of the garden. With a total to date of 26 foxes shot with the.22lr & N750 I would say it's been a huge success, better than I envisaged and with more foxes than I ever imagined, numbers are starting to slow down a bit now but I suppose that's to be expected, with a railway line 80yds away and a shopping centre 1/4 mile away with lots of food shops and takeaways a steady flow of new foxes is almost guaranteed.
The last four foxes were all vixens and being urban foxes I'm surprised at the good condition they were in, must be the quality food they're eating.
The only downside with this product is that it needs to be plugged into the mains, maybe someday someone might bring out a battery operated system that can be operated remotely to be used up at the farm, now that could be fun.
So for now I just set up the camera until I know there is a fox patrolling the garden I then set the bait station up, switch on the radar and wait. - Happy days.
