OOPA: Fox debate rages on in Tasmania

More than a decade after the reported introduction of foxes to Tasmania many people believe that foxes are established, yet others believe that a breeding population does not exist and never has. The elephant in the living room is that a number of things don’t seem to add up and the living room floor is about to collapse if we ignore these things for much longer.

Biologist Dr Clive Marks questions the science being relied upon, and argues for an independent scientific review of the entire application of the scat-DNA technique to confirm once and for all the validity of OOPA foxes in Tasmania.

Elsewhere on the same site, biologist Nick Mooney addresses many of the issues Dr Marks raises, and confirms $20 million has so far been spent trying to discover if foxes really are in Tasmania - and cautions sceptics not to 'throw the baby out with the bath water' when contemplating the existence of Vulpes vulpes in the island state. 

Overseas readers may wonder what the big deal is...the fox is obviously not native to Australia and, until relatively recently, the island state of Tasmanian was considered fox free. So is it or isn't it? That is the question...

OOPA: Foxes in Tasmania

The debate surrounding the possible existence of the cunning and elusive Tasmanian fox (Vulpes vuples) has once again reared its head after a fox was reportedly spotted near the state's capital, Hobart, this week.

Farmer Bob Judd saw what he believes was a fox on his property this week.

"I grew up on a farm in South Australia and I know exactly what a fox looks like," he said. "There was this red apparition running like lightning, grease lightning, up the hill and it was a fox - it had a red bushy tail and all the rest of it."

Officers from the Fox Eradication Program have taken detection dogs down to the property to locate the animal. The Manager of the Fox Eradication Program Alan Johnston, says more than 2,000 fox sightings have been reported since 2002.

Foxes were introduced to Australia in the 1850s by English settlers, but Tasmania remained fox-free until the 1990s when evidence of their presence began turning up.

The fox has inflicted enormous impacts on the native wildlife of Australia, being implicated in the extinction of many native animals.

Tasmanians can report fox sightings and any other evidence (unusual scats, den sites, stock kills) to the FOX HOTLINE 1300 FOX OUT (1300 369 688).