A Bad Time of the Year if you are a ginger/ginger and white cat apparently

 Be aware that the "Fox carrying off a cat" posts have started appearing on FB groups.

Every year the same thing -a fox seen carrying off a cat -usually, due to lack of imagination?- a ginger or ginger and white one. The problem with FRB and public groups is that pro hunt and anti fox groups have their people join., "I love foxes!" gets them past the rigorous checks 😂 of group admins.

Foxes will carry their young from den to den but thi9s is a little too early (?), however, foxes will take food dishes, water bowls, at one time my solar garden lights, slippers and even fluffy toys left out.

Since 1976 I have not come across one single genuine report of a fox killing or carrying off a pet cat -cats are often bigger than the fox and heavier so a fox "running around" with one in its mouth is dubious at best and reveals either a lie or or not very good eyesight. Every year "I caught the foxes killing my cat on CCTV" or "I watched them kill my cat" and ask for the footage and the language back might be abusive but the "proof" is never shown. Odd. Also, why would you stand and watch something attack and kill your pet cat?

Ask these people for a photo of their cat...nothing. They used to snatch images off the internet but got caught out so often.

Even the London Natural History Society in the 1960s looked at fox-cat interactions and noted that if it came to a confrontation "the fox ran for its life"

We know that it was the hunts that used to kill pet cats and even badgers to drag them behinds horses to leave a trail they hoped a fox might follow. In the 1990s in Midlands parks pet cats were killed and used for fox baiting.

So long as FB groups just allow anyone on this will continue because there are few places these people can post their obvious lies. Last year I think it was 11 or 12 such claims -ignoring how a "herd of foxes" was terrorising a village high street. Checks with local vets showed that no cats were taken in with bite wounds or as victims of fox attacks and when I revealed that the argument was "It may have gone to a vet outside the area" -again a provable lie by one of the group admins who was a friend of the person pushing the story so I just said I'd report the matter to FB and...post removed.

It is a constant war to help protect wildlife and try to educate people on facts and this same thing happens with wolves, coyotes and jackals where the hunt is challenged.

Don't fall for the lies. Be aware.