The Right One to Rescue – by Sharon Kent
ISLAND | ONLINE ONLY | AUSTRALIAN NATURE WRITING
Dusk. The road is matte black, narrow and winding through state forest, ducking through the trees like a fugitive. Driving in this light, the bush is a monotonous blur of khaki – ‘gum blindness’ as my English friend once called it.
My son, relegated to the back seat of the car for bad behaviour, pipes up sullenly.
‘I need to go to the toilet.’
‘Well, you’ll have to hold on,’ I reply, not bothering to conceal my annoyance. We’d disembarked off the Spirit of Tasmania ferry that morning, driving north to visit a friend in rural New South Wales. So far, I’d endured six hours of bland scenery and bickering, culminating in a series of wrong turns. It was becoming less likely that we’d make the dinner booking at the Batlow Hotel and I wasn’t happy.
‘I’ve got no idea where I am. And it’s getting dark.’ My pitch is rising and I know I’m working my way up to the place where there’s danger of a freewheeling rant. I have just a sliver of grace left to slow the car. There’s no verge here – we just stop on the bitumen. I haven’t seen another vehicle since we entered the forest half an hour ago.
‘There.’ I dismiss him with a flourish, take my glasses off and stare at my phone, muttering darkly about Google Maps and the lack of signs.
‘Mum?’
‘Oh, look – 5%! I’ve only got 5% of battery left. I squint at the battery icon. ‘Less than 5%. We’re going to miss the dinner.’
‘Mum! There’s a cat on the road. With a bucket on its head.’
I am studying the map. From somewhere, I half-hear this ludicrous statement, but I dismiss it, like an annoying mosquito that I can’t be bothered to swat away. I turn to my son. ‘It’s going to be dark soon. Will – you – get – in – the – car!’ I flash him a stony look. ‘Hurry up!’
He hesitates, looking down the road forlornly, before trying a different tone.
‘There’s a cat on the road. With a bucket on its head.’ He speaks evenly, as if he’s dealing with someone who doesn’t understand his language, where there’s no point becoming exasperated or overly excited.
‘What?’ I’m listening now, but still unable to comprehend what he’s saying. ‘Well, is it still there?’
“He has me now. I haven’t got time, we have to get going, but I want to see it – this cat, with a bucket on its head. Out in the middle of nowhere.”
He has me now. I haven’t got time, we have to get going, but I want to see it – this cat, with a bucket on its head. Out in the middle of nowhere. I climb out of the car and look down the road. Fifty metres away, I can see an animal sitting in the centre of the bitumen, quite still, like a sculpture, hefted from a pedestal and placed on the road as a prank. Ridiculous, but fascinating. I’m no longer thinking about the map, the phone battery, the approaching dark. Even the booked hotel dinner has lost its currency. In this moment, there’s only my son and I, warily approaching this creature, our footsteps light and careful.
‘It’s not a cat.’ I am peering into the distance and trying to discern its features, quietly talking to myself, rather than my son. ‘Is it a wallaby? You can see a tail. What’s on its head?’
We’re cautious, walking stealthily, willing the creature to stay. The companionship between us is palpable. In this moment we’re together, completely focused, breathing in unison, eyes set on the prize. My son matching his pace to mine – for once, not running ahead.
We are ten metres away now, and I’m still puzzled. It is not a wallaby – I can see that now. Then, suddenly, I realise what it is. For once, I am a parent who is confident, who irrefutably knows.
‘It’s a fox!’ I shout triumphantly. ‘With a chip bag on its head!’
We are three metres away and the animal remains sitting, its bushy tail long and thick, trailing onto the surface of the road. The fox sits like our dog when she is trying her utmost, body upright and symmetrical, forelegs stretched out in front like a fully extended tripod. As we approach, the fox stands and takes a few tentative steps away, then swings around and sits down again, back straight – no cowering or submission, like a prince before a sword.
We stop and watch. The chip bag is tight, jammed over the fox’s muzzle and eyes, pulled up to its ears, with a ruff of fur encircling the edge of the packet like a garish ginger halo. The bottom of the bag expands each time the creature breathes out and contracts tight to its face as it inhales.
The scene before me is mesmerising. The panting fox. The crinkle of the chip packet, marking time with each inhalation like a percussive metronome. The road beyond, a swathe of black cutting through dry sclerophyll forest. The sun low and intense; everything imbued with a surreal twilight glow. A subtle scent of eucalyptus as the air cools. In those few seconds, I hesitate. My son looks at me. I’m no longer a parent who knows. I don’t know what to do.
“In those few seconds, I hesitate. My son looks at me. I’m no longer a parent who knows. I don’t know what to do.”
*
The boardwalk at Bruny Island is full of people, despite the weather. It’s windy and cold, one of those nights when I wonder if anyone will show up to hear a talk about little penguins and shearwaters. But they do. As the presentation winds down, I segue from predators to the topic of foxes and their potential presence in Tasmania.
I pull my jacket in tight, fold my arms across my chest and talk about Vulpes vulpes, the European red fox, that was introduced to Australia in the 1850s for recreational hunting. I talk about how prolific this pest has become in the mainland states, the cost to wildlife and the loss of native species.
‘Foxes are super-efficient hunters,’ I say earnestly. ‘Tasmania is a last refuge for so many species that no longer exist on the mainland. Native hens, bandicoots, potoroos, quolls – and so many other mammals, reptiles and birds. Scientists estimate that in Tasmania, foxes would predate on 77 native species.’
I pause for effect and hold up the pelt of a fox. ‘If foxes establish a population in Tasmania, the impact on our wildlife would be devastating.’ Everyone nods in agreement, bar the old cocky off to the side. He shakes his head and snorts.
‘All those millions spent on finding an animal that’s not even bloody here.’
‘Ah’, I say. ‘Now, there’s a conversation!’
In my brightest voice, I lay out the evidence, talk about how it’s not worth the risk to Tasmania – to our unique fauna – to be complacent, to do nothing. That it’s worth government funding to prevent foxes from establishing a viable population. He’s not convinced.
I shrug it off. I know it’s worth it. I toss the pelt into my backpack. The only good fox is a dead one.
*
My sister is about to buy a gun. She has just completed a course on gun handling and has purchased a safe. She lives in New South Wales, in a rural area, and decided to get a firearm after trying to help a badly injured kangaroo, caught up in a barbed wire fence on her property.
‘Damn foxes,’ she growls to me on the phone one night. ‘I heard Bella barking the other day and rushed outside thinking it was a snake, and she’s running round and round the vegetable garden – chasing a fox! Right near the chook house.’
‘So, when you get the gun, would you shoot a fox?’ I venture tentatively.
There‘s a short silence. ‘I would. Yeah,’ she says solemnly. ‘If it’s hanging around the house yard, after my chickens, I would.’
Despite growing up on the mainland, I have rarely seen a fox. Once, I saw a streak dash in front of the car, a blur of ginger with a long trailing tail. Occasionally, I’ve glimpsed roadkill. I never pull over, even if it looks recent. Vermin. An introduced pest species responsible, scientists now say, for killing 300 million native animals in Australia every year.
We talk for a while. About the foxes. Her small, plucky dog, chasing the fox. And the chickens her neighbour lost last week – four ISA Browns. The night she heard a noise at her door and found a fox at the doorstep, with one of her thongs in its mouth. The times she sees one sitting brazenly atop the large boulders adjacent to her house, surveying the countryside like a land baron.
I persist. ‘So, what’ll you do if it’s just sitting up on one of the boulders?’
My sister takes a moment to answer. ‘Dunno,’ she says shortly.
*
Living in Tasmania, the closest I have come to a fox is in literature and on television. For a time, almost every day, I had a date with my young son to watch Peter Rabbit. It was an end-of-the-day treat to sit down on the couch and listen to the brave and smart, slightly cocky Peter and watch the cute little bunnies raiding Mr McGregor’s vegetable garden.
Most episodes, the bunnies would come up against their nemesis, Mr Tod, the sly and ruthless fox, imbued with the kind of cleverness that consistently backfired. Well-dressed, with a plum English accent and a slightly effeminate manner, Mr Tod threatened violence, but only ever seemed to run around flustered, in the manner of children’s cartoons.
‘I like Mr Tod,’ my young son stated resolutely one day, as if expecting resistance.
‘Oh, do you? What do you like about Mr Tod?’
‘He’s not that scary. And he’s funny.’
I am only half listening. On the screen, all the bunnies are panting with fear, down in a hole in the ground, while Mr Tod is cursing and trying to dig them out.
‘But how can you like foxes – remember when we lived in the Blue Mountains, what they did to Sue and Erika’s chickens!’ The chickens down the road from us had all disappeared overnight. No gore and barely a feather left behind, just a neat, cartoon-like exit.
He stops and considers this. ‘Well, he can’t help it. It’s not his fault he was born a fox.’ He shrugs nonchalantly. ‘He’s just doing what foxes do.’
We turn back to the show. Now Mr Tod has the bunnies in his cooking pot, rubbing his hands with glee, until Peter trips him up with his wooden spoon and they all manage to escape.
‘Foiled again!’ I say with a theatrical snap of my fingers. ‘But will the fox live to fight another day?’
‘Of course he will!’ my son replies.
*
I am standing in an administration building, laptop in hand, waiting for help with an update.
My work colleague takes my computer. I notice she has an attractive cloth bag cradled on her lap. It’s moving. ‘Here,’ she says, thrusting the bag towards me. ‘Do you want to hold it?’
I reach out and she gently passes me the bag.
‘You can have a look, but no touching.’
I hold the pouch carefully. When I open the top and peer inside, I see a hairless creature, a ‘pinkie’, fully formed but still with an embryonic appearance – part alien, part recognisable animal. It’s an unfurred joey, a baby wombat. I hold the warmed pouch carefully against my abdomen and as the creature stirs and stretches, milk-drunk, limbs poking against me, I have a sudden déjà vu sensation, a body memory of a years-ago pregnancy, of feeling my baby turn and kick against the same abdomen wall, but from the inside. The animal lies still momentarily, and I am thinking, that was weird – then it happens again. The joey squirms and settles and I remember with a rush the feeling of holding a vulnerable newborn, the involuntary reflexes, the nestling of a small life against my abdomen.
‘So, you’re feeding it, what – every few hours?’ I ask.
She nods and I marvel at the dedication of wildlife carers.
When I hand the pouch back to my colleague, I feel a maternal jolt and a reluctance to let it go, mingled with a renewed sense of responsibility.
Precious native wildlife. Worth saving. Worth protecting.
*
“In the moments that we stand there on the road, I can feel my son’s gaze shift from the fox to me. In those few seconds, my 13-year-old intuits my dilemma. Foxes are vermin. Foxes are to be exterminated. Not saved.”
In the moments that we stand there on the road, I can feel my son’s gaze shift from the fox to me. In those few seconds, my 13-year-old intuits my dilemma. Foxes are vermin. Foxes are to be exterminated. Not saved. When he speaks, it is in his wisest, firmest voice. ‘We can’t leave it Mum.’ A warning note plays there, like a bass undertone, underwriting everything.
‘No, we can’t.’ I heft the conservationist’s voice aside, relieved that I can now focus on the practical task at hand. My son watches me, waiting for me to do something. This is a major mummy moment. I approach the fox and stop a metre away.
The fox is sitting stock-still. Only the chip bag moves, as if of its own volition; inflating, deflating, in, out, in, out, the edge of the bag so tight against its fur that I wonder any oxygen gets through at all. I squat and lean forward, stretching my hand out and pinching the bottom corner of the bag between my forefinger and thumb, ready to whip it away, fast, like pulling off a band-aid.
This is something I’ve learned when handling wildlife. You have to fully commit, be fully present. You can’t be tentative. Even if you’ve got it all wrong – the way you straddle it, grasp it, bag it. Even if it bites, you have to hold on, no matter what. Like a mother. Like me with my teenager. It’s the holding that counts, even when nothing else is going right.
I pull the bag off with a firm, quick tug, ending with a flourish, like a sheet pulled from a painting. In that moment I’m face to face with the fox. I see its neat, pointy ears, the thick ruff of fur at its neck. The alert face with its quivering whiskers. The quality of its pelt, the colours so rich and vibrant, as if it has just been washed and groomed. The fox is motionless, poised between flight or fight. We all stare together, the three of us. It is only seconds, shards of time, before the fox turns and runs, down the hill, away from us and our car. It stays on the bitumen until the road levels out, before ducking into the forest. It has gone, but we stand in silence watching. Moments later, it re-emerges onto the road and looks at us from a distance. Then, with a swish of its magnificent tail, exits left.
Walking back to the car, we are both buoyant and the feeling stays with me as I make further wrong turns and dodge roadside kangaroos. My mobile phone is flat. It’s dark and we’ve long missed dinner. But my son is in the front seat, and the memory – with all its conundrums and complications – lies rounded and fully formed between us.
We drive on. ▼
Image: Michael Mouritz
This work is part of our Australian Nature Writing Project suite.
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