I know people are waiting as this is the first fox post mortem project of its kind in the UK and the results from over 60 foxes submitted to the Bristol Fox Deaths Project will be published this year.
The problem is that when you are involved in an underfunded project getting all the tests our pathologist wants carried out can be slow. Do not misunderstand me; we have a top pathologist with over three decades of experience and the Animal Plant Health Agency, PM Services, etc., have not put any blocks on the work and have been more than helpful. As a result the Wildlife Network for Disease Surveillance are getting some very interesting data and Natural England is getting to see what is going on regarding fox health.
The Project would not have worked had it not been for volunteers as I do not drive. Emily Finnegan was involved in the early days before withdrawing and Zoe Webber stepped in until early 2023. The Bristol Fox Lady, Sarah Mills then stepped in adding to her workload. It is important that these volunteers are recognised for what they did and in the early days there was hinderance from Bristol City Council and even others supposedly involved in wildlife rescue faking and reporting dead foxes (no, I never worked out the mind set of those morons either).
When the report does get published, and I really want it to be this year, it will offer a basis from which rescues and vets can work from and some of them will find their statements that adenovirus and canine hepatitis are all to blame for certain fox deaths shot down. As with people saying every dead fox "was poisoned" and a similar statement from vets, no one can say what a fox died from until tests and a post mortem have been conducted.
Fox health and death are far from simple and facial injury cases as well as three legged foxes are far from rare.
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