Connie – a fox in a fix!

Connie…

It has been much too long since I last updated my blog and I apologize for that. My heart hadn’t been into writing this past year. Too many life altering events distract me, I guess.

But there have been some heartening happenings in the wildlife rehabilitation at Iggy’s. Take for example, Connie, the fox. Way back in December of 2019, I received a call from Tyler P.

Tyler, it seems, had been driving when he spotted a fox on the side of the highway. It was obviously in a very bad way. When he approached it, he saw it had a 120 Conibear trap, usually set as a body gripping, instant kill trap for marten and mink, over its neck, ear and jaw. The past week had been extremely frigid, often in the -30C and the fox showed signs of hypothermia. It would not have been able to eat or drink and had frost bitten ears. He gathered it up and took it home where he removed the trap and warmed it. It was a few days later when he was able to connect with me and delivered the poor thing.

The trap had cut off circulation around its neck, the cold metal had frozen the skin and flesh and edema had set in. The little vixen’s face had swollen so badly it had the appearance of a Sharpei. I had little hope for it and was ready to arrange to have it euthanized. But there are times when it is apparent an animal has a will to live.

I trimmed away the matted bloody fur to examine it further. It murmured a few complaints but let me handle and clean its wounds without a struggle. It slowly regained its strength on broths and liquefied meats, still unable to chew. Then infection set in.

Daily cleaning of the wound and antibiotics kept it comfortable, and it would now stand, clean itself, and showed interest in its surroundings. By mid-January, I felt it would benefit from an outside enclosure. I moved her into a 8X12 foot run, with straw filled crates for her to hide in. She improved each day and the wound was no longer infected. There was a piece of skin and fur which would eventually fall off, but the open wound had healed over with new skin.

By the end of January, she had scratched off the matted and dead skin and fur from her neck and looked quite normal. And she was ready to get out! A male fox kept coming to visit her in the night. Their courtship calls were unnerving to my poor dog as fox calls are eerie and haunting at times.

Foxes are good climbers and smart. By mid February, she had pushed the crate over to the wall and climbed out to meet her boyfriend. The tracks in the snow showed a bit of play and rough and tumble activity…and then two sets of tracks headed back into the thick brush. Several times later that spring, I would see the two of them on our pond. And she had visited her old enclosure from time to time to haul away the food I continued to leave for her.

Almost every day, foxes visit us, and sometimes a chicken will disappear, but mostly they come to a site where I leave food for ravens or eagles. I like to think Connie is one of them, and she was able to continue on as a normal vixen despite her traumatic injuries.