MY wife and I have been members of the Wildcare group, Friends of Lillico Penguins, for three years.
On Monday evenings during the breeding season we attend the viewing platform as volunteer guides. On Monday December 19, as we were approaching the carpark at the platform, I sighted what we now know was a dead fox. After we parked our car, I walked back to have a good look at the creature. (And Ian, before you jump on your keyboard to ask how I could see it in the dark, the time was around sunset.) The carcass was not blown, nor had its guts been opened up by ravens etc., so I guessed it no more than a day or two dead. Generally it was in good shape, although the side of its head had been struck hard. I didn’t see any feathers.
At the end of our shift, we filled out a routine report form on which we noted seeing a dead foxy-looking puppy. These reports find their way to PWS and we assumed that if our report was deemed significant, somebody would act on it. As it turned out, nobody did but keep in mind that PWS is certainly not overstaffed. Over the next few Mondays we saw the carcass decomposing, becoming a bad smell and we lost interest.
So it was not until the news reports in mid-February, that we realised that our sighting was most likely of the same animal. I contacted FFTF and told them what I’m disclosing now. I went back to the spot, where the flattened and dried remains had been recovered, with a member of the taskforce, who pointed out the penguin feathers ground into the bitumen amongst a few other remains. When I wrote that its gut contained feathers, that is my opinion. Perhaps I should have been a little clearer, but I believe it’s a very reasonable opinion. I don’t know yet what the FFTF has concluded in that regard.
I propose that although the carcass was off the carriage way it was eventually run over by a vehicle pulling onto the shoulder. Any other explanation for the feathers than that they came from the gut, e.g. that someone put them under a rotting, stinking carcass, is taking conspiracy theory to new heights.
Ian, the main point is that the animal was a fox, here in Tasmania. I was not desperate to prove it. It is simply a fact. Why are you so desperate to deny the evidence? Simply because the police could find no evidence of importation, doesn’t rule out that it hasn’t happened.
