Why no pet foxes?
April 26, 2009 1:56 PM   Subscribe

Can foxes be domesticated?

Are there any instances of foxes being domesticated to serve as pets or task animals? Can they be domesticated? If not, why not?
posted by WPW to Science & Nature (21 answers total) 2 users marked this as a favorite
 
I don't know if this qualifies, but it shows that they can be trained.
posted by Solomon at 2:01 PM on April 26, 2009


Best answer: Yes
posted by hindmost at 2:03 PM on April 26, 2009 [1 favorite]


Damn you, hindmost. You beat me to it. If I remember correctly, there was a guy in the U.S. who did this as well.
posted by Foam Pants at 2:05 PM on April 26, 2009


Best answer: Domestication is basically a breeding process. Check out this article on tame silver foxes.

The project was ostensibly undertaken to prove that domestication causes patches in the fur. I'm not sure how much of that is caused by simply removing selection pressure against spotted coats.
posted by pwnguin at 2:06 PM on April 26, 2009


Here is an example. I've heard of several instances of this, it's rare but not that unusual.
posted by fire&wings at 2:25 PM on April 26, 2009


I saw something on PBS or such a while back, which I cannot find right now, which spoke to this issue... said basically, it takes a few generations to produce foxes which act tame (although they will not actually be "tame" in the housecat / puppydog kind of way). There's something about the domestication process which causes a different series of hormones and other chemicals to be released into the bloodstream which causes, after a few generations, the ears and tail to reposition themselves during the animal's development, maybe also causes the patchiness mentioned earlier. It has to do with perceived threats and how the animal has to respond to them, etc.

I wish I could find that show. It was 3 steps beyond interesting, and answers this question really well. *sigh*
posted by hippybear at 2:34 PM on April 26, 2009


I remember seeing something about the Russian foxes in this Nova special about Dogs.
posted by interplanetjanet at 2:44 PM on April 26, 2009


Yes, also mentioned in a previous question I asked.
posted by beerbajay at 2:47 PM on April 26, 2009


I know a couple of people who've raised foxes from tiny cubs. They stuck around until they reached sexual maturity then they took off. Domestic canids never really mature the same way a wild one does and that is a result of selective breeding so to make a truly tame fox you'd have to breed for those traits.
posted by fshgrl at 2:53 PM on April 26, 2009


Thought they apparently can't be fully domesticated, many people keep fennec foxes as pets.
posted by saladin at 3:58 PM on April 26, 2009


I had a friend who had a so-called domesticated fox as a pet. He adopted it as a small cub from a fox farm. I say "so-called" because this little creature was the most destructive critter I have ever seen. He had a room in his house he kept it in, and that room was totally torn up. Wallpaper shredded, wood trim chewed up. The fox was finally put down because it bit someone, it was not vaccinated, and the state wasn't convinced that it would be testable for rabies with a simple two-week quarantine.
posted by lleachie at 4:29 PM on April 26, 2009


You know, it's like what I've said about pet monkeys--don't you think a lot of people would have them if they made good pets? I mean, same thing with raccoons, and squirrels, and lions, and hippos: do you think you're the first person to think of this? "Though they apparently can't be fully domesticated" is a huge red flag.
posted by MrMoonPie at 4:30 PM on April 26, 2009


I knew people who kept a fox in their house. It was horribly destructive, smelled terrible, and I'm pretty certain it was miserable, despite all the food it could handle and an entire bedroom to itself full of cardboard to rip up.

Bleah. I found the whole thing annoying and rather sad for the animal. Some creatures are not meant to be friends.
posted by dragstroke at 4:54 PM on April 26, 2009


Best answer: >There's something about the domestication process which causes a different series of hormones and other chemicals to be released into the bloodstream which causes, after a few generations, the ears and tail to reposition themselves during the animal's development, maybe also causes the patchiness mentioned earlier. It has to do with perceived threats and how the animal has to respond to them, etc.

Yeah, once selective breeding brought the baseline adrenaline levels underneath a certain threshold, out came the floppy ears, spotted coats, relative dimness, and puppy-like behavior.

It's odd to think that dogs, our lovable best friends, really are retarded downbred wolves.
posted by darth_tedious at 5:13 PM on April 26, 2009


Response by poster: MrMoonPie, it's not something I'm considering doing. I was woken at 4am this morning by an urban fox ripping up a rubbish bag one of my neighbours had unwisely left on the kerb five days before collection. I watched it for quite a while out of the window and idly wondered if ... etc. I have been turning over the question of how some animals become our companions, some become our helpers/slaves, some bcome our food, and some ... remain animals ... all day. Thanks for the answers everyone. I had a feeling that people would at least have tried.
posted by WPW at 5:23 PM on April 26, 2009


The backwoods way of putting it might be that foxes can be tamed, but they're not domestic. Skunks can be tamed. Deer, somewhat. Squirrels can be tamed. Lions can too. But while I trust my Brittney/Daschund mix (yes, he looks odd) *almost* implicitly around my child, I would never, ever, ever trust a tamed wild animal, no matter how friendly they were at the moment.
posted by mrmojoflying at 5:46 PM on April 26, 2009


Yeah, you can tame a fox. My neighbors have done it - also, the guy in Herzog's Grizzly Man had some fox friends that lived with him.

That said, foxes are some of the smelliest critters on God's green earth. If I'm in the woods there are two animals that I could pick out of a briar in the middle of the night with a blindfold on - foxes and black bears. Stink to high heaven. If you want to domesticate an animal, get a possum. They're super friendly, eat what you eat, smell nice if you wash 'em and like to sleep a lot.
posted by Baby_Balrog at 6:01 PM on April 26, 2009


I once got attacked viciously by the cutest little yellow tabby cat I mistook for another one that looked almost alike. (The good one was named Max and we named the other one Evil Max... it had 1/4" white tail tip and was otherwise identical.) I bent down to pet it and made a little wiggle with my hand and before I could scream "Mistake!", it had latched onto my wrist, shredded my hand and bit the hell out of me.

Point is, even tho as I sit here and type I have my favorite cat in my lap, I have a profound mistrust of even the most domesticated pet. They are equipped with hard teeth, sharp claws, and the miracle of leverage in the way their pieces work. Even the best ones stink, destroy stuff, throw up on things, kill the birds, bite the mailman or whatever. This is with 5,000 years of domestication.

If the fox could be made into a good pet, you wouldn't be asking the question. Ditto for most other animals... the low hanging fruit were the cat and dog. And who ever heard of a modern dog killing anyone? (This week, I mean!)

I happen to be one of those folks who subscribes to the tenets of social biology which postulates a major genetic contribution to behavior in all animals, including us. While the intergenerational times are short for canids, and you'd think we could quickly breed a tame/sweet population, the fact that we don't see people walking thier foxes or leopards around the block should be a good indicator that it's either not an easy task, or that the risks of even a small failure outweigh the benefits of cuddling up with your stinky fox at night. (And they do stink! Almost worse than my beagle. phew!)

(That said, I LOVE LOVE LOVE the way the fox looks, and wish I lived on a planet where they were domesticated. So cute!)
posted by FauxScot at 6:11 PM on April 26, 2009


in BC it's illegal to keep a wild animal without a permit (this includes wild animales that have been "tamed") and it might be in other areas too.

also, fox urine smells like skunk spray and they piss all over their dens.
posted by klanawa at 8:12 PM on April 26, 2009


Point is, even tho as I sit here and type I have my favorite cat in my lap, I have a profound mistrust of even the most domesticated pet.

Unlike most other pets, it's believed that cats weren't domesticated through breeding the way dogs and cows and others were. I guess they just followed us home one day.

And really, they're the pet that keeps on giving. I'm told you don't have to train cats much to use kitty litter.
posted by pwnguin at 10:58 PM on April 26, 2009


Most animals that are able to be domesticated already have been, so the answer to this question is always "No, not really."
posted by electroboy at 7:10 AM on April 27, 2009


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