Killing foxes in your garden

Is it legal to trap a fox with a snare then kill it? Maybe with an axe? Just wondering if I might upset the neighbours….

I believe snares are illegal, especially in built up area's. Something to do with cruelty to animals..

Shotgun?

Is it legal to trap a fox with a snare

No. Quite rightly classed as inhumane.

then kill it? Maybe with an axe?

No. Quite rightly classed as inhumane.

If you've got problems with foxes then I'd suggest local council or local pest control company. I would avoid DIY solutions as you would lay yourself open to prosecution on the grounds of animal cruelty.

Do you really even have to ask this question ?

if you can trap and kill a Fox using manual methods without losing most of your digits and a lot of blood then you can go on my wall of fame.

Why on Earth would you want to kill a fox???

Yes, I understand entirely. I keep getting birds and insects in my garden. I was wondering if I could net them and then pull their wings off before battering them with a hammer!

Why would you want to…….. they keep pests away. When the fox is around you dont see any grey squirrels around here.

exactly, why would you want to kill a fox? Is it killing chickens? If so protect them better

troll?

Foxes are beautiful animals, unless they are causing a lot of damage (in which case I would try hard simply to disuade it from visiting) then leave it alone.

Is it?

Is it legal to trap a fox with a snare

No. Quite rightly classed as inhumane.

Why, why, why do people insist on spouting complete and utter shite without any knowledge of the law?

Tiger – where you based? if you're in the SE then I'll happily come round and give the fox a humane high speed injection of plumbum for you!

troll?

Dude, you'll need more than a snare and an axe to kill a troll. Ever seen one? Big ugly brutes they are.

Nuke it from orbit

One question about (non-mountain) bikes – the rest just dumb. Troll in the style of many others before – or is it the same one many times?

Foxes kill chickens for the fun of it. I grew up on a farm and from time to time a fox would get into an enclosure and kill every chicken in there but only take one or two.

Farmers for this reason hate them – Warton protecting them is almost impossible. Everybody wants free range eggs and you can't build a foxproof fence right the way around huge fields full of chickens. They want to be outside in the daytime and in the coops at night.

Snaring is a terrible means of dealing with any issue like this and I'm sure the fox would have much to say whilst trapped in the snare, no doubt scarring all the kids in the street for life. Assuming its crapping in your garden or rummaging through the bins, contact your council and see if they can get someone to sort it.

Foxes might be nice to look at but they do cause problems that need dealing with, especially for farmers.

Is tiger_roach a farmer?

A good mate of mine at the time many years ago had a pet chicken once, called Kentucky. Kentucky was huge (he used to say it was a vulture cross) and used to run to the back door to see him if he was in the kitchen and all the kids from the area used to call round to play with Kentucky.

One day a fox ripped Kentucky’s throat out and so my mate thought he’d get his revenge, he doped some meat and then staked the fox out after it ate the meat and passed out. He chopped off a limb a day until it died. The Fox lasted three days.

Some time after that the same mate cleavered off three fingers belonging to a bloke in a pub over a disagreement.

Some time later still he was doing a three stretch for the massive drugs operation he was running via local biker gangs, not to mention the unproven accusations regarding firearm retailing.

Just ask yourself, do you really want to be like this kind of person?

NB, Just to make this clear, I no longer have anything to do this guy whatsoever.

Assuming its crapping in your garden or rummaging through the bins, contact your council and see if they can get someone to sort it.

does that mean i can get the council to sort out all the neighbours cats as well?

Now, if we'd been talking about cats from the start 😉

My mrs mum keeps chickens and has a fox trap. She gets all exited when she catches them and has them shot by a bloke down the road. Really pisses me off. I would much rather see a fox running across the fields than a load of stinking, noisy flea ridden chickens. E@#king old witch.

so long as you are not chasing after it on horse back with a pack of hungry bloodhounds and spaniels then I think you might be alright if you don't get caught by the animal loving brigade.

Foxes are beautiful animals – to look at- but they are a pest nonetheless so you have my blessing to dispatch it. just don't get caught! 😉

Foxes are beautiful animals

in the countryside, most urban foxes are shabby flee bitten mainge ridden horrors

Like many dogs then.

This is all brilliant!

OK, I have chickens but they're protected; but a fox crushed a strawberry plant so now it's war again. I'm thinking maybe build a fence around the patch though….

BTW, Zulu-Eleven I am in the SE if you fancy a go?!

once saw a sheep that had been caught in a snare when i was on a scout hike

it had shredded its back leg to pieces trying to get away, it still traumatizes me thinking about it

thankfully it was dead when we found it, was grim enough seeing the aftermath, sheep make disturbing enough sounds at the best of times

You can snare animals, but certain types of snare are illegal, and placing snares / traps in such a way as to catch protected species is illegal.

I researched this a little after finding a snared fox on a farm I was surveying. The above about snares never being legal is claptrap.

However, it's unlikely that you'll be able to kill the fox in a humane manner once you've snared it.

Shooting it is out of the question in an urban area, except with an air rifle, and you may well struggle to make a clean job of it.

I'm not a squeamish person when it comes to killing animals – I grew up on a farm myself, but catching things in snares really isn't pleasant at all. Animals will, on occasion, knaw off limbs to escape, and snared animals are an absolutely pathetic sight. I expect what would happen in reality is that you'd snare the fox, and then be unable to kill it, leaving you in a rather difficult situation.

If you seriously want to keep foxes out of your garden, get a dog.

misterfrostie – Member
Foxes kill chickens for the fun of it.

That's hilarious! A fox's sense of FUN recognised by humans!

Coyote – Member

troll?

Dude, you'll need more than a snare and an axe to kill a troll. Ever seen one? Big ugly brutes they are.

no silly he means a troll is a good way to kill a fox! duuuuurrrrrr!

Is it legal to trap a fox with a snare then kill it? Maybe with an axe?

Is your real name Dexter?

make a fox hat?

Protection of Animals Act 1911
1 Offences of cruelty
(1) If any person-

(a) shall cruelly beat, kick, ill-treat, over-ride, over-drive, over-load, torture, infuriate, or terrify any animal, or shall cause or procure, or, being the owner, permit any animal to be so used, or shall, by wantonly or unreasonably doing or omitting to do any act, or causing or procuring the commission or omission of any act, cause any unnecessary suffering, or, being the owner, permit any unnecessary suffering to be so caused to any animal; or

(b) shall convey or carry, or cause or procure, or, being the owner, permit to be conveyed or carried, any animal in such manner or position as to cause that animal any unnecessary suffering; or

(c) shall cause, procure, or assist at the fighting or baiting of any animal; or shall keep, use, manage, or act or assist in the management of, any premises or place for the purpose, or partly for the purpose of fighting or baiting any animal, or shall permit any premises or place to be so kept, managed, or used, or shall receive, or cause or procure any person to receive, money for the admission of any person to such premises or place; or

(d) shall wilfully, without any reasonable cause or excuse, administer, or cause or procure, or being the owner permit, such administration of, any poisonous or injurious drug or substance to any animal, or shall wilfully, without any reasonable cause or excuse, cause any such substance to be taken by any animal; or

(e) shall subject, or cause or procure, or being the owner permit, to be subjected, any animal to any operation which is performed without due care and humanity; or

(f) shall tether any horse, ass or mule under such conditions or in such manner as to cause that animal unnecessary suffering;

such person shall be guilty of an offence of cruelty within the meaning of this Act, and shall be liable on summary conviction to imprisonment for a term not exceeding six months or to a fine not exceeding level 5 on the standard scale, or both.

The Wild Mammal (Protection) Act 1996 protects most mammals from a variety of cruel acts which are intended to cause unnecessary suffering. When a fox has been captured the Protection of Animals Act 1911 can also be used to prosecute those people who ill treat the fox.

Poison: There is no poison that can be legally used on foxes. Use of a poison to kill foxes would lead to either a large fine or imprisonment.

Gassing: Again the use of any gas to kill foxes is illegal.

Spring traps: Can not be used against foxes and traps with teeth have been illegal in this country since 1954 for all animals.

Free running snare: May be legally used to catch foxes but is subject to many restrictions. In urban areas its doubtful that these restrictions can be met.

Self tightening snare: Is illegal

i belive the answer to your question is yes it is likely to be illegal and you might end up in prison..

misterfrostie – Member
Foxes kill chickens for the fun of it.

That's hilarious! A fox's sense of FUN recognised by humans!

No, maybe not for 'fun' as we know it, but they really will kill 30 chickens and then take just one to eat.
I don't think people would mind if poor-ikkle-foxy-woxy-diddums took the odd snack every now and then, but it's easy to understand why they aren't liked.
I'd have no qualms about shooting one on that basis if I needed to.

Foxes kill all the chickens in a coop so as to immobilise the food source, they will then return for all of the dead chickens in turn, as they can only carry one or two at a time to a 'safe' location for them to consume at their leisure.

However, most of the time, the fox will be disturbed in the process of retrieving the prey, and won't come back.

Personally, I like urban foxes, most of the fairly tame foxes in bristol are nice to have about and only cause a nuisance if residents are acting stupid by leaving rubbish out for weeks etc. I'll see a couple every week and they all look pretty fit and healthy. I've even seen dappy cliftonites tryign to feed them fromthe hand.

In the country, foxes are a complete PITA and can be a serious drain on your stock and finances, not to mention hard to deter once they know your stock is there. I'm not going to tell anyone how to manage their stock, becuase I don't know **** all about it, I can well believe that shooting them in the head is the best option and I'm perfectly supportive of that.

Free running snare: May be legally used to catch foxes[/u] but is subject to many restrictions. In urban areas its doubtful that these restrictions can be met.

Self tightening snare: Is illegal

i belive the answer to your question is yes it is likely to be illegal and you might end up in prison..

You see, there's your problem Crankboy, its one or the other – as for the mythical "restrictions" that are "unlikely" to be met, they're all covered in DEFRA guidelines and refer only to codes of practice, not the legality of snaring.

snaring with a well placed, non locking, correctly stopped snare is a perfectly legal, valid and effective method of restraining foxes for dispatch – something I'd suggest you or anyone else here would know if they'd actually done it, rather than reading about it on t'internet!

Free running snare: May be legally used to catch foxes but is subject to many restrictions. In urban areas its doubtful that these restrictions can be met.

Set on your own land and checked daily, it's legal, unless the caveats I mentioned earlier about protected species (Schedule 6 is you want to google it) come into play.

No snaring Badgers, Hedgehogs or Bats now!

But if you had humanely trapped 'Ol' Fantastic' himself, couldn't you dispatch humanely with a blow to the head?
I imagine, being fairly 'bumpkin' myself, that if I properly leathered a fox with something baseball bat-esque, it'd probably been done in one blow. I mean, if you really went for it, like you'd caught a French man with the wife sort of thing?

Surely that's as humane as you can get? I wouldn't mind going that way, if i had to choose.

Is it illegal to snare an escaped labrat and beat it a few times with the back of an axe? Just to keep it quiet like…

But if you had humanely trapped 'Ol' Fantastic' himself, couldn't you dispatch humanely with a blow to the head?

I very much doubt that many folks on here would be able to bring themselves to do it. I expect a deal of those who could, would probably do it in a ridiculously half hearted manner, maiming it rather than killing it cleanly.

And if the neighbours saw you, I'd be amazed if they didn't get the RSPCA or Police around, legally done or not. There are shades of grey to killing something humanely, and shooting is the obvious method which is clearly humane, but that's not possible in an urban context. A blunt instrument would most likely be perfectly humane in the right hands, but I'd much rather be in front of Mr Ruraltown JP rather than Mr Urbanite JP if it came to it.