Foxcam’s last couple of outings have resulted in very murky, unclear images. I really didn’t think we’d had fog so I’ve been a little concerned. Last night, I had kept foxcam cool in the house and put it out early to acclimatize, then wiped the [so-called] lens down to remove any condensation that might have accumulated.
Having researched mange when Ratty appeared, we discovered from the National Fox Welfare Society that one way to administer their homeopathic medicine is via a jam sandwich. So, not having any meat scraps left over, we went with a jam sarnie made up of specially purchased, crappy Warburton’s bread slathered with left over cranberry jelly. I also threw out a pile of peanuts hoping Broc might be appreciaitive.
This morning I was at first gutted to see further murky clips begin to load. “Bother”, said Pooh, crossly. What on earth [whose earth, I don’t know] is causing this? I sat waiting for the long-winded loading to finish and saw that the last three clips were actually clear. So, it doesn’t seem to be a camera problem; it does look like atmospherics. The temperature had dropped to –7°C at one point.
Our first visitor, a fox, was not until 02:45. It was limping but wasn’t Limpy; this one was favouring its right rear leg very noticeably. What am I going to call this one, Cassidy? [Hands up if you remember Hopalong Cassidy.] Here’s a shot to show the lack of any clarity – and I’ve cleaned this up a bit. At first Cassidy seemed to ignore the jam sarnies and went for the peanuts. “Oi, those were for Broc”. 🙂
There was another visit by a very agile, wary-looking fox at 03:30. Without detail, matching to any previous visitors really isn’t practical. It was in good nick, though, but didn’t seem interested in the jam sarnies, two of which remained.
So to the clear clips, recorded as late as 05:55. This was another fit fox and a very handsome specimen. My suspicion is that it’s a younger one. Other than the fact that I was back to recording clear video clips, which was something of a relief, the biggest puzzle here was that there were now no jam sarnies visible. What on earth had happened to them? There were some left at the end of my final murky clip and now there were none. Curious.
Wow, that’s impressive that the Fox organisation are sending out free medicine. Is it preventative as well do you know? Do you have enough doses to keep putting out laced sarnies until Ratty gets one?
I don’t know if it’s preventative as well as curative, no. We don’t actually have any of it. Having sent a picture of Ratty to one of our Beds Natural History Society mammal chaps, he thinks Ratty’s problem was the result of an injury of some kind rather than mange (‘cos the rest of the coat looked OK).
We haven’t seen Ratty again, BTW.