“I never set out to have pet foxes. It just happened”.
Patsy Gibbons was surely an animal lover. He got a big bunch of 28 hens and 12 ducks; not just that, he also had two dogs and two cats in his house. With that number of chicken and duck he owned, it seemed not quite right to adopt a pet fox, let alone three of them.
However, this man from County Kilkenny, Ireland is no ordinary man. Accompany him are three fluffy cute sidekicks, Grainne, Minnie and Henry.
Grainne was a 7-year-old female fox. She was the oldest one in the trio and was found by Gibbons’ brother-in-law in a storehouse near Columba’s Hospital in Thomastown. Grainne was trembling in the cold inside a box, she was abandoned there, just a few weeks old, weak and thin. Gibbons took her to the vet and then cared for her ever nonstop since that time.
As the words spread, people knew that Gibbons was taking care of a fox, Minnie and then Henry was brought to him as well. Minnie, a five-year-old female fox, was a month-old pup at that time; a woman found her in Kilmaganny. For Henry, a man living in the nearby town of Graiguenamanagh said to found him attacked by a dog.
Gibbons carefully nurtured these foxes like a father, they recovered and decided to stay with him instead of going back to the wild. Maybe they wanted to repay their rescuer.
The fox trio and their master became famous to the local children as a matter of fact. They even received invitations from schools that want them to visit their places, for the children could see them first-hand.
People from all over the country and also the UK were asking for his advice on taking care of foxes. Gibbons said he was no expert but he was happy to advise as a layperson.
