some of you
deserve to have the faces eaten off you by animals for these lousy puns.

or keyboards stolen at any rate.

so, back on topic: it didn't quite attack me, but it looked as if it might.

few years ago. summer heatwave. i was a law student living in a girlie houseshare and had a stupidly enormous bedroom. it was baking hot, and i was sleeping with all the windows open. i'd been tempted all summer, but had learned about so many criminal cases where robbers and rapists came in through the window that i hadn't dared. oh fuck, who am i kidding, i was terrified of moths and daddy long legs coming in, ok??

but this night was hot enough to dispel the Fear. or most of it.

at about 2am i was woken by a slithering, scraping noise. it sounded like a bag of bones being dragged along the top of a coffin. i tried to ignore it, but it carried on scraping.

i sat up and almost screamed in horror at the sight opposite me: a shadowy, sweaty figure, with hair sticking up all over the - oh, wait. that would be the mirror.

but the scraping continued. forgetting i was starkers, i decided to investigate. i crept all the way across the floor to one of the sash windows and peered cautiously out.

there was no murderer brandishing a hook. there was no drunken would be rapist propping his ladder against the wall. no enormous spider scrabbling after me with his 8 evil pincers.

instead, there was a gigantic fox doing its best to climb the tree outside my window. i didn't know foxes could climb trees (and this one was really crap). for a moment we both froze. we stared at each other. then the fox tipped back its fat orange head and barked at me!!! of all the nerve! it was saying "fuck off back to bed," i know it was.

anyway, this point, we were both distracted by the wolfwhistles and shouts of a huge group of lads coming home to the aussie dosshouse opposite (lovely people but about 15 of them rented this one bed flat, argh, they made so much noise!).

at this point i remembered i was in the nak, and hastily fell backwards on my sofa so as not to blind the antipodean population of west london. the fox legged it as quickly as an obese space hopper shaped fox can move.

does anyone know why foxes climb trees? do they eat pigeons or birds eggs by any chance??
( rachelswipe with a fork, Thu 1 May 2008, 13:20, 18 replies)

You Mean?
You've never heard of Flying Foxes?
( Legless Mister Stabby - shanks for the memory, Thu 1 May 2008, 13:22, closed)

Oh, Ms Swipe...
Once again a tale that involves forgotten-about nekkidness.

You're a star and no mistake.
( Davros' Granddad a voice of calm reason in a world of spastics., Thu 1 May 2008, 13:23, closed)

It was prolly sharpening it's claws.
Or possibly trying to get some grapes, a la Aesop's Fable.
( Bert Monkeysex is waiting for the mods to delete him, Thu 1 May 2008, 13:24, closed)

this time though
noone saw except the fox!

maybe he wasn't barking. maybe he was laughing.

damn you, davros!
( rachelswipe with a fork, Thu 1 May 2008, 13:25, closed)

They're not really supposed to
I know grey foxes can, and if red foxes live near grey then they sometimes imitate them, but their claws are too blunt to manage it effectively and anything they could get to up a tree is almost certainly more able to move than they are!

Maybe it was just after eggs as you suggested, or maybe it liked to get up the tree to sleep off a meal (you said it looked fat?).

Foxes learn all sorts of odd behaviours, they're very adaptable and will scavenge or hunt anything they can really.
( Jessie © needs pirate name suggestions, Thu 1 May 2008, 13:27, closed)

WTF
Is a "grey fox"? A large squirrel perhaps?

Edit: Just looked it up. The Gray Fox (Urocyon cinereoargenteus) lives in the USA and Canada but some have been known to swim the Atlantic, turn up in London, and teach the urban Red Fox how to climb trees.
( Legless Mister Stabby - shanks for the memory, Thu 1 May 2008, 13:29, closed)

Grey fox = Wolve
.................possibly
( whenanimalsattackhumans clad in global hypercolour, Thu 1 May 2008, 13:29, closed)

@Legless
George Hamilton
( Bert Monkeysex is waiting for the mods to delete him, Thu 1 May 2008, 13:29, closed)

Grey fox = gray fox
They're American I think? very similar to the red but grey in colour. And sharper claws ;)

Edit: Hahah, def. not a squirrel
( Jessie © needs pirate name suggestions, Thu 1 May 2008, 13:34, closed)

Foxes
will go anywhere if they think there's food in it for them.

Handsome buggers that they are..and I don't think there are any grey ones living wild in the UK...that said we've got wallabies living wild around here, so who knows?
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Thu 1 May 2008, 13:43, closed)

@Chickenlady
*head desk*

Do you really, really, think that there's a pack of ninja grey foxes, in London, teaching our foxes (and even though they're both called foxes, they're only *very* remotely related - they're not even the same species. And they certainly can't cross-breed) how to climb trees?

I thought better of you.....
( Legless Mister Stabby - shanks for the memory, Thu 1 May 2008, 14:00, closed)

Actually Legless,
having seen the Animals of Farthing Wood cartoon when I was little, thus making me an expert, I can confirm that there are gray (or possibly silver) foxes in Britain.

Don't pick on chickenlady, she rocks socks.
( Bert Monkeysex is waiting for the mods to delete him, Thu 1 May 2008, 14:05, closed)

i saw it!
ok, it hadn't got very far. in fact, its hind legs were still on the ground. but it was trying to climb that tree!!!!!
( rachelswipe with a fork, Thu 1 May 2008, 14:06, closed)

We believe you
Honestly we do! Well, I do at any rate. Why else would you be hanging out of a window in the middle of the night, and nekkid?
( Davros' Granddad a voice of calm reason in a world of spastics., Thu 1 May 2008, 14:07, closed)

@Ds' G
Well, I often do it when I'm angling for sparrows.
( Bert Monkeysex is waiting for the mods to delete him, Thu 1 May 2008, 14:11, closed)

Well...
I was just trying to be kind...As it was Jessie who suggested the grey foxes...and she's a nice lady who I've met twice now. She didn't laugh at me when I was rather drunk.

So in the interests of being nice, I left the door open for ninja foxes.

But okay, if it's biological correctness that you want....We only have red foxes. They can climb trees, as can some dogs. Grey foxes are folk like George Clooney, who may well be able to climb trees, and maybe it was actually him outside Ms Swipe's bedroom (IN HER DREAMS!! and mine too).
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Thu 1 May 2008, 14:14, closed)

George Clooney you say?
Wonder how to get him outside my bedroom window ..
(TheWeeWitch hasn't been here much recently .., Thu 1 May 2008, 14:17, closed)

In order to attract George Clooney
one must hang political treatise from the nearest trees, yes, treatise up treeses.

Then bark in the full moon while wearing a rubber body suit.
( chickenlady b3ta's very own Elizabeth Taylor, Thu 1 May 2008, 14:26, closed)