Note: This story was first published in April 2017 and is being shared again.
Taking out the trash in an English yard on a normal day turned into an unexpected rescue mission. Craig Mcgettrick and a friend found an old mattress at work. What they found under it shocked them: five tiny animals that they thought were puppies. They had no idea that what they had found would lead to an interesting story of mistaken identity and a touching meeting.
McGettrick chose to do the right thing even though he wasn’t sure if the animals were puppies or kittens. He carefully put them in a cardboard box and took them to a place that helps animals in need. Before he left, he put pictures on Facebook to ask for help and tips.
When Martin Hemmington, the head of the National Fox Welfare Society, saw these pictures, he became interested. Concerned person Beccie wrote to Hemmington to say that she thought the animals in the pictures might actually be fox cubs. Once their true identity was confirmed, it was clear that these cute cubs had been taken to a rescue center by mistake because people thought they were dogs.
Paul McDonald, a local animal rescuer known as “The Fox Man,” said that fox cubs don’t look much like adult foxes at first. Because they are brown, not red or ginger like adult foxes, they are often confused for dog puppies. Most likely, the mother fox had been giving her cubs a place to sleep in the old cushion.
After getting in touch with McDonald, Hemmington set up for the cubs to be picked up from the rescue center and brought to him. McDonald, with a kind heart, set out to find these fox babies and bring them back to their mother.
McDonald made sure the cubs would cry out and call for their mother so that the mother would notice them. Putting them near where they were found first and adding a hot water bottle to the cardboard box to keep them warm was all he did.
After a long and tense wait, the mother fox finally showed up an hour later. She carefully picked up one cub and went back several times to get the others, making sure they were safe.
By 7 o’clock that night, all of the cubs were happily back with their mother. The empty box was proof of this wonderful success story.
Everyone involved, from McGettrick to Hemmington and McDonald, was very happy with the outcome. Nature was able to take its course, and the rescue and reunion were both good things. McDonald called it “the best kind of rescue” in his line of work.
There are a lot of stories that make you feel good, but this one really stands out because it shows how much a mother and her kids care for each other and how close they are.
Sources: The Dodo
