Foxes: It’s simple

Nick Mooney Wildlife Biologist. DPIWE
It’s simple – foxes are very rare here. A number of shooters have reported seeing foxes in Tasmania. It is informative to contemplate the probability of actually bagging a fox clearly seen. I have attended considerable amounts of professional shooting on mainland Australia and found that only about 1 in 7 foxes clearly identified as such were killed and this was even when people were well prepared to shoot foxes (the right equipment ready, not travelling too and from sites etc). All manner of things from distance, house positions, terrain etc conspire to make it hard. What it means is that where foxes are very rare they are equally unlikely to be shot. The same goes for photos. At least scats stay in the landscape for some time and we can work out detection probability; the likelihood of finding a scat in the landscape using standard search techniques. That ability to make a measure is why we increasingly rely on scat searching to get a measure of foxes.

I would argue that there have been a series of carcasses that are highly probably foxes killed in Tasmania and two sets of clear footprints (and a number less clear that could well be fox). There has also been the above blood and Mr Rist has conveniently ignored the 32 scats that tested positive for fox DNA and the one containing fox grooming hairs (found before we had a DNA test). This can’t be ignored in a rational treatment of material evidence but perhaps that is not what I am responding to.
To whom it may concern

I feel a response to Mr Rist’s contribution from someone who has dealt closely with the fox issue is in order, limited because there is a huge amount of material involved and readers should be spared too much repetition. One problem is that Mr Rist himself does not consistently follow the rules of evidence he advertises but relies heavily on here-say in his conclusions. Sometimes heresay he encounters becomes proof to him. That is fine on a personal level (ie for Mr Rist or anyone else with similar preconceptions) but I suggest is of little or no other value.

I will make some comments in italics within Mr Rist’s text simply to aid in comprehension and context. Most of what I have to offer has been on these pages before and/or is on the DPIW website so sorry if it is too familiar.

It’s really all about a rational evaluation of evidence and risks associated with that evaluation.

Nick Mooney

DPIW

Ian Rist wrote:

4th January 2009

I believe the Tasmanian fox issue is based on 2% fact and 98% speculation, hoaxing and fabrication.

Fabrication is a very serious accusation Mr Rist. I hope you have very substantial, defensible evidence for that call otherwise I suggest you should withdraw it and apologise.

Reasons being:

In 1998, May 31st, a lone fox did exit from a container shipping vessel at Burnie Port. Many witnesses.

Here we have a reliance on eyewitness accounts not really much different to the other sighting reports Mr Rist glibly dismisses. The actual material evidence of that event was a string of near perfect fox footprints I found along the low tide line of West Beach at 0500 hrs on 7th June. A number of these prints were cast. I find it curious that Mr Rist ignores this material evidence instead choosing to use eyewitness accounts; he knows it exists.

In May 2001 another single fox escaped from a (machinery) container at Agfest, Carrick. Witnesses.

Again the only evidence is eyewitness accounts, albeit by several apparently credible people, but it is still not material evidence and therefore open to dispute.

This same fox was seen several days later on Illawarra Road, Longford, only 5km away. It was seen by well known, respected, wildlife authority Chris Spencer (ex NPWS).

How do you know it was “the same fox” Mr Rist? Again we have Mr Rist accepting a sighting report(s) where otherwise he dismisses them. Chris Spencer is a superb naturalist but even he admits it s still only a sighting report. Others have been by people with similar credentials. Chris Spencer has never worked for NPWS. Mr Rist I think you are confusing Chris with Steve Cronin indeed a very experienced ex PWS wildlife ranger. Since you seem to believe him you might be curious to know that Steve’s report came from Brambletyre on the Nile River, not so far from where the Cleveland fox and a number of fox scats were found.

This was the catalyst for the following events and on the 20th June 2001 a Police and DPIW Ministerial briefing was conducted.

I have never doubted these two incursions (Burnie and Agfest) and have always believed the incursion by shipping routes is a day to day possibility.

Is it not true to say you never doubted these select items simply because they support a theory of yours?

Information was given to the Minister that two lots of fox cubs – 8 in one lot and 11 in another – were smuggled in, reared and released. A subsequent Police investigation involving (7) seven detectives did not uncover one single piece of evidence to corroborate these allegations. Letters confirming that no evidence had been discovered to corroborate the allegations were forwarded on 13th July 2001 and 17th July 2001 to the Deputy Commissioner of Police and subsequently to the Minister. Nevertheless, this importation theory has been and remains the foundation for the explanation of how foxes arrived in Tasmania. At the time the information given to the Minister was incorrect, but the Minister had NO option but to act and he acted appropriately at that time.

Of course the minister had no option. He is well and truly on record as recognizing the potential catastrophy. Given the evidence we have, I suggest we all have no option except to act as decisively as possible. My main fear is that we have not acted as decisively as necessary. In some respects our reaction has been conservative considering our aim is to eradicate foxes. We simply cannot take the risks Mr Rist would have us take, that the issue will go away if it is ignored. It will not.

The investigation was into any alleged conspiracy to import – essentially whether there was deliberate importation. It concluded before any material evidence of foxes became available.

This fox cub import theory has been used in NPWS, STATE LIBRARY, DPIW and the schools’ Outwit, Outfox, Outplay fox ELS Material.

We have very substantial evidence of foxes in Tasmania. Considering the importance of the issue I think it is very relevant that theories of how this has happened are discussed. There are plenty of precedents for foxes being deliberately introduced into Tasmania for hunting and who knows what else. One of the first foxes released in Australia was released (and killed) at Oatlands in 1864 and in 1890 a pair (also killed) were openly bought in to bred up for hunting. Another was bought in in 1911 and two were reportedly caught near Scottsdale in 1912, one being donated to the Hobart Zoo. We then have a fox caught in the wild at Riverside in 1972 and lots of reports of introductions in between.

However, seven long years have passed without one single fox being recovered by shooting, trapping, poisoning or even being photographed by remote infrared cameras put at every “hotspot”.

There has been a fox shot (see below). Poisoning by 1080 is unlikely to produce a carcase because symptoms take several hours to manifest and canids typically go to ground. Considering how many thousands of foxes are poisoned by 1080 on mainland Australia very, very few are found. There is no point trapping (by leg-hold, box traps being all but useless for foxes) unless the close whereabouts of a fox is known. Even then, it is far from a given. Most cameras have been unreliable in function (battery durability etc). Only now are we getting useful numbers of high quality cameras – the technology has much advanced in recent years. Where foxes are common photos are relatively easy to get but where foxes are extremely rare (such as here) photos are far from guaranteed – just like with any very rare animal.

The so-called fox evidence presented has always broken down both scientifically and pathologically. Examples:

(Fox) footprints found at Woodstock Lagoon in 2001 (10 days after famous Longford fox photo) proved to be from a whippet dog belonging to farmer Jamie Cox.

We recorded the prints of all local small dogs we could get including Mr Cox’s whippet and none closely matched the canid prints we recovered. In case your wondering, the whippet freely trotted about Mr Cox’s back yard and was easy to record while visiting a friend who rented a cottage there. A whippet has a very different foot to a fox. The prints we collected were not whippet feet and by far most closely match fox. Mr Rist, what is your “proof”? Perhaps nothing more than wishful thinking.

(July 2001), Skin of famous Longford photo fox mailed anonymously to DPIW in Launceston was DNA tested and matched to the Symmons Plains shot fox (September 2001) as siblings.

Our advice from the DNA analyst was the match was likely cousin and may have been sibling. Months later we received advice that the ‘closeness’ was less reliable than at first thought. I agree we should have made more of that then. It should be remembered that all foxes in Australia are pretty closely related anyway, the tens of millions (yes – tens of millions) having come from a few pairs.

However, I now know the Longford fox (photo/skin) was a hoax and the names of the persons involved. For 4 years the Government allowed this DNA matching to be relied upon as conclusive evidence.

For a time, the incident was regarded as one a growing list of material evidence. It has been regarded as inconclusive on our website for years. It is still not concluded. Unfortunately, even if someone comes forward and claims to have perpetrated it we still could not be sure since some people make silly claims just to be mischevious. For Mr Rist to truly “know” it was hoax he must have been part of it or seen substantial material evidence or he is again dressing up heresay to try and make a silk purse from a sow’s ear. I’d agree it probably was a hoax but we have an anonymous letter from someone claiming to have been there, insisting it was all true. We will likely never know for sure. In practical terms that issue is not so important because so much else has happened.

However a senior DPIW official admitted to me in an internet forum and in a newspaper (Southern) years later that indeed the Longford fox was a HOAX.

Although flattered, I am not a “senior DPIW official” – I am a mid level wildlife biologist. It was not “admitted” (implying it was being hidden) – it was freely offered as comment by me to the press and I said I thought it was likely a hoax.

However, in the interim, gut samples removed from the Symmons Plains fox and analysed by an unqualified non pathologist officer of the department were said to have contained an endemic Tasmanian long tailed mouse (NOT found in the Symmons Plains area).

Samples of fur alleged to have come from this gut content were sent to a mainland expert who confirmed that the skin did come from a Tasmanian long tailed mouse. Evidence provided to me in 2002-2003 led me to believe that the Symmons Plains fox was shot at Geelong in Victoria. I have given a sworn statement to Tasmania Police to that effect.

You know this is wrong Mr Rist. The gut content was retrieved from the fox by a taskforce officer with some evidence gathering training and sent to independent experts for analysis. Arguably one of the top experts in mammal identification in Australia reported part of the gut content as long-tailed mouse Pseudomys higginsii – identified from hair, bones and teeth. There was nothing in the gut to suggest the fox died outside Tasmania. Although there indeed are no records of this mouse from Symmons Plains per se, no one has ever looked there (absence of evidence is not evidence of absence). The species has a wide distribution in Tasmania and I have identified it in an owl pellet from similar habitat at nearby Epping. The mouse may have been eaten many km away from where the fox was shot. The species is found only in Tasmania, that is what is most important.

On the 12th September 2002 the ABC Catalyst program featured a story on how the foxes arrived in Tasmania…the narration began 2 years ago, a group of environmental vandals committed an unthinkable crime. They hand reared up to 19 (11 plus 8) fox cubs and released them into the previously fox free Tasmanian wilderness.
These are the same 19 fox cubs referred to in the Tasmania Police letters of 13th and 17th July 2001.

The program even showed footage of foxes being release from cages to simulate a release into the Tasmanian environment.

Either catalyst were lied to, didn’t do adequate research, or both.

This Catalyst program was taken to task in the Parliament by the MLC member for Murchison Tony Fletcher on the 26th September 2002. The Upper House Hansard of the 26th September 2002 confirms this.

This was reflected in the Mercury article headlined “Fox Fraud” after which the editor of the Mercury wrote to DPIWE apologizing for the inappropriate term.

The October 2003 Burnie “roadkill” fox discovered by an anonymous cyclist (who had ‘phoned Police) on the main road outside Burnie Mitsubishi was never tested and proven to be a resident fox.

The only way this can be done is to find something on or in the fox unique to Tasmania – such as the mouse in the Symmons Plains fox (see above). We looked but found nothing unique to Tasmania or mainland Australia in the Burnie fox. Any fox in Tasmania presumably came from mainland Australia’s narrow genetic stock. Genetistists tell us we are unlikely to find any DNA unique to Tasmania.

If indeed DNA testing was carried out the results were never publicly released.

The animal had not eaten for 6-7 days which indicated it had been contained.

How on earth did you come up with 6-7 days? The gut contained scraps of rat hair of a species found in Tasmania and also mainland Australia. If the gut was largely empty all that indicates is that the fox probably hadn’t eaten anything that would linger in the gut for a day or two. Foxes have high metabolisms and turn over food quickly.

It had been killed by several blows to the skull.

I’m interested how you are so sure about “several blows”. The post mortem said it was killed by heavy impact to the head. We received an anonymous tip off (of the ‘hiss in an ear’ kind) that it had been killed on an incoming boat at the docks and dumped on the road but there is no evidence of this. It was very freshly dead when retrieved by the police from the road. There is nothing material to change the deduction that the fox was road-killed there. Considering the public rubbishing witnesses get from extreme skeptics, who could blame them for being anonymous from the public. We respect requests for confidentiality.

The Lillico fox cub remains (February 2006) were discovered after another anonymous cyclist claimed to have seen a small freshly killed fox cub on the road at the Lillico Penguin Observation site on Christmas Day 2005. However, the cyclist did not report it until their return to Canberra 2 months later. The Task Force converged on Lillico and scraped the matchbox-sized remains out of the bitumen. Subsequent testing proved it to be fox material.

The Lillico fox was first reported to penguin observation station staff as “puppy like” (I saw the original notes) and therefore did not trigger any special response. Weeks later a tourist cyclist reported seeing a young fox dead on the side of the road in that area at Xmass. At the time she saw it, she reportedly had not realized there were not supposed to be foxes in Tasmania so didn’t think it special but was later encouraged to report. The report by this tourist was unclear in place and it was not until the person who reported the “puppy-like” road-kill inquired as to the result of their report that we found it. There was substantially more than a “matchbox” and it was confirmed as an approx ten week old fox pup by its jaws and DNA.

No follow up evidence in the form of siblings, parents, natal dens, scats or photographs were obtained from this site. This is just not possible.

If you think “this is just not possible” I suggest you are inexperienced with anything aside hunting fairly common animals. As stated on our web site, much later we received a report that a local shooter killed this pup (1 of 2 he reportedly saw) some distance away while shooting rabbits and moved it to where it would be found. Confidentiality for the shooter was requested by the reporter (again because of fear of public ridicule). Hopefully we will get more information.

I suggest the fox cub arrived at Lillico by other means.

In May 2006 a chicken kill occurred at a property at Old Beach, Hobart. The Task Force was called in to monitor. Five (5) days later blood spots were discovered and tested and shown to contain fox DNA.

However, no photographs of foxes or any other conclusive scientific evidence was obtained. The chickens were tested and found to have dog (canine) saliva on them but no fox (vulpine) saliva.

This was from a second lot of chickens killed on the same property. Importantly it was saliva on the chickens’ feathers. No material for testing was retrieved from wounds. Dogs and other domestic animals were at times all over the property and it would be hardly surprising for a dog to slober over dead chooks there. The place was on a bush edge and wildlife and feral animals were also common.

This was written up in five different stories in a southern newspaper as a full fledged fox attack.

Later it was discovered that fox urine products had been used at this site and could have contaminated DNA Testing of the blood.

You also know this is not true Mr Rist. On 17th May, barbed wire and sand was put adjacent to holes in fences hoping to collect hair from passing animals. On 22 May blood was collected from underneath the wire. On 5th June the test came back as Fox. On 14th June cameras were placed and only on 19th June (nearly 1 month after blood was collected) fox urine was used in a last attempt to lure a fox in. If you think DNA contamination can occur with this sequence of events Mr Rist your conclusions are unreliable in the extreme.

The second chicken kill with dog saliva occurred during this sequence. Chicken kills are not unusual in Tasmania and originally this was not treated with particular concern, especially since it was away from fox ‘hotspots’. It only became a priority after we got DNA results back by which time the fox could have been far away before we placed cameras. Mainland fox experts invariably say they could not predict what foxes do without normal territorial strictures and population structures. Some think they may keep moving looking for other foxes. It is a serious problem for our eradication efforts. In retrospect we should have acted more quickly and aggressively at the time.

On the 1st August 2006, three agricultural workers were going to work on the Glen Esk Road Conara. The lead driver in a spreader looked down and saw an animal on the side of the road, he spoke to his boss by radio following him and asked him to look at the animal. The animal was a dead fox.

This animal was reported as the “real deal” “dead certain” still warm evidence. However, subsequent pathology tests revealed the animal had been killed 24 hours or more earlier (previous day).

At 1055 hrs the animal had a core temperature 1.5 degrees celcius above ambient. The day was rapidly warming and more than an hour before, when the fox was reportedly first seen by these gents, would have likely been more than 10 degrees above ambient. That’s a warm fox. However, body temperature is only part of the story in working out time of death. When I first saw the fox at about 1040 hrs on 1 st August it was in the back of a ute. Its eyes were full and bright but dried and wrinkled over the next few hours. There was no smell of putrifaction and the jaw noticeably stiffened over the next few hours. The most experienced pathologist examining post mortem tissue suggested the fox died 12 to 24 hours before those samples were chemically fixed (preserved) in mid afternoon that day in fact suggesting it probably died on the evening of the 31st July. Indeed we received an anonymous call that the fox was road-killed near Epping hours before it was found by the agricultural contractors on Glen Esk Rd and moved because the adjacent landowner didn’t want to be part of any furore. That is entirely possible. There was nothing in the gut or fur (gravel and pollen) to suggest it was other than a local road-kill. All this has been reported on our website for several years.

This fear of public ridicule people often freely express is of great concern to me and is something the cynics must take a great deal of responsibility for. I asked a farmer friend in that area what he’d do if he came across a dead fox?

” Ignore it” he said, ”if it was where someone else would find it”.

I asked what he’d do if it was not in such a place?

“I’d move it to where it would be found” was his reply.

No wonder evidence is often complicated and witnesses remain anonymous.

Scepticism certainly assists inquiry by challenging assumptions but once the level of scepticism reaches the cynical then the effect reverses. I wonder where we’d be now with these matters if public ridicule of witnesses was not so severe that they run for cover.

What complicates this incident is that on the 3rd August 2006 a senior manager of the DPIW released a press statement saying that a driver had come forward and although he wanted to remain anonymous he believed he had killed the fox.

It only serves as an example of an inaccurate statement by a manager who never talked to the original source. That’s hardly unique.

At 9.30am approx the fox ran out from the LH side of the road and was struck by a LH tyre and killed. He stopped, saw it was a fox and continued on his way not wanting to be involved in controversy. The problem is, the nominated driver, JL, was present and interviewed on the morning of 1st August and said nothing then about running over a fox. WHY NOT??

On site, he told me he first felt a bump then on looking thought it was a fox then contacted the driver following. He told me at the site that he was not sure if the fox was alive or not before he ran over it. He may have told someone else something different or ambiguous. There was blood on the road where the men said the fox was and that blood was fox by DNA test. All this has been on our web site for years.

He was one of the three agricultural workers that discovered the fox. Strange coincidence, but this fox was discovered the very day two branches of the Task Force were to close.

Rubbish, there was no such deadline. This so-called correlation between deadlines and evidence is myth. Let’s see a thorough time-line presentation of all evidence and so-called deadlines Mr Rist. I suggest you have no idea of most of our deadlines. There are so many deadlines for funding and other decisions in the public service that the odd coincidence is inevitable.

Two task force personnel were only minutes away delivering a field stripped vehicle back to Launceston and were first on the scene.

We were not first on the scene. There were two of the farm contactors already there with the fox. I was one of those people and we were going to yet another meeting in Launceston, in doing so delivering a vehicle emptied for resale. Nothing odd about that. We were nearly at Launceston when notified and turned back. Most times we are never anywhere near evidence events. Why not mention that Mr Rist?

I now know that this fox was not killed at that Glen Esk Road site and I also know the names of the persons involved. I will be testifying to that under oath at the upcoming Public Accounts Committee inquiry.

I again challenge Mr Rist’s “know”.

Seven long years have not produced one single fox from Tasmania, Not shot from the 10,000 plus spotlight permits in force and the 40,000 plus hunters, not poisoned from 250,000 plus 1080 meat baits laid, not trapped and most damning, not photographed from the thousands and thousands of images taken from remote infrared cameras located at Tasmania fox “hotspots”.

Its simple – foxes are very rare here. A number of shooters have reported seeing foxes in Tasmania. It is informative to contemplate the probability of actually bagging a fox clearly seen. I have attended considerable amounts of professional shooting on mainland Australia and found that only about 1 in 7 foxes clearly identified as such were killed and this was even when people were well prepared to shoot foxes (the right equipment ready, not travelling too and from sites etc). All manner of things from distance, house positions, terrain etc conspire to make it hard. What it means is that where foxes are very rare they are equally unlikely to be shot. The same goes for photos. At least scats stay in the landscape for some time and we can work out detection probability; the likelihood of finding a scat in the landscape using standard search techniques. That ability to make a measure is why we increasingly rely on scat searching to get a measure of foxes.

I would argue that there have been a series of carcasses that are highly probably foxes killed in Tasmania and two sets of clear footprints (and a number less clear that could well be fox). There has also been the above blood and Mr Rist has conveniently ignored the 32 scats that tested positive for fox DNA and the one containing fox grooming hairs (found before we had a DNA test). This can’t be ignored in a rational treatment of material evidence but perhaps that is not what I am responding to.

I believe the evidence so far provided is what is known as easily transportable evidence.

What isn’t “easily transportable”? Given enough effort anything can be hoaxed including an apparent fox den. My question to Mr Rist and Co is – what is the evidence of hoaxing beyond scuttlebutt and gossip? Considering the risks to Tasmania I think it would be grossly negligent to assume hoaxing without very substantial evidence of such.

I personally transported three fox carcasses back from the mainland in 2003 and showed them to Minister Green and convinced him how easy it was. Before the misinformed jump up and down, it is NOT illegal to bring in dead foxes or parts thereof…. It happens on a regular basis for trophies and taxidermy etc, as long as there is no gut, livers or fruit/vegetable material in the fox it is perfectly legal.

Over fifteen hundred “fox” sightings have been recorded in Tasmania. Not one of these sightings have been substantiated,

But Mr Rist, you believe the sighting reports from Chris Spencer (and maybe Steve Cronin??), the Burnie ship and the container at Agfest. I am bewildered by your inconsistent and selective use of evidence. I agree that eye-witness accounts are unreliable as a form of evidence. So why pick a few that suit you to believe? It is very hard to know which reports are truly what. I tend to believe Chris Spencer and some witnesses because I know them very well and have great respect for their powers of observation and honesty in such matters but others who don’t know them might not. In any case Mr Rist, you don’t actually know Chris Spencer so your faith in him itself lacks credibility.

I have no doubt many of these sightings have been reported in good faith. I have been mistaken on two occasions and thought I had seen a fox, both these were later proven to be large ginger feral cats.

You actually reported one as a fox and never officially withdrew your report despite my earlier challenge on these pages. They may well have been cats but how were the animals you reported sighting “proven to be a large ginger cats”? Yet again, your convenient assumption is not proof.

There have been in excess of 4,000 Thylacine “sightings” since the last one died in the Hobart Zoo in 1936, however not one of these sightings has been substantiated either.

I have personally shot many foxes in Europe and on mainland Australia, both by calling up of a day and spotlighting of a night. They are not easy by day but are relatively easy of a night with a spotlight. The eyeshine signature is unmistakable and is quite obvious.

They sure can be easy where they are very common and even I have shot them in Victoria. But Mr. Rist, very few, if any, people have useful experience with this animal in such low numbers as we have. Would you have us sit about and wait until they were easy to shoot?

You were one of the skeptics demanding substantial, systematic monitoring. Now we have it and it is producing uncomfortable results it is outrageous to just ignore it because it doesn’t suit your point of view. What risks you take with Tasmania Mr Rist! It would be far more useful for you to put your hunter’s mind to how to get rid of foxes in our unique circumstances than just scornfully dismiss every bit of evidence in doing so intimidating witnesses from coming forward. Kind of self serving don’t you agree; creating anonymous witnesses so you can criticize the anonymity of witnesses. Its called cynicism..

I look forward to the upcoming PAC inquiry.

Signed,
Ian Rist