To prevent a baby fox from imprinting on humans, staff at a wildlife centre in the United States are wearing a fox mask when interacting with the orphaned animal.
A video posted on Facebook by Virginia’s Richmond Wildlife Centre on March 12 shows a staff member in a fox mask feeding a young rescued fox. The female kit is being syringe-fed milk by the staff member, who is clad in gloves and a light-brown-and-white fox mask.
The centre said in a comment on the post that the fox’s eyes are just starting to unseal. If the animal were to open its eyes to see a human offering food, it might associate humans with food, as feeding is a form of positive reinforcement.
“When her eyes do open, her vision will not be fully developed. Her vision will be blurry, and she will see more silhouettes and forms than full details initially. So she will see the shape of the snout, fur, big ears. Not a human,” the centre added.
Staff at the centre “minimise human sounds, create visual barriers, reduce handling, reduce multiple transfers among different facilities, and wear masks for the species” to ensure that orphans raised in captivity “do not become imprinted upon or habituated to humans”.
The centre said in a Facebook post on March 1 that it got a call the day before from the Richmond SPCA humane society, which had initially thought the animal was a kitten.
That post described the newborn as barely 24 hours old, and deaf at this age. The baby fox, which weighed just 80g, still had its umbilicus stump attached. It had no teeth and its eyes were sealed.
Richmond Wildlife Centre said in the March 12 post that it was able to locate fox kits of the same age and weight as the orphan, and is working out plans to see how the animals can be raised together.
It is in the best interest of this fox to be with other foxes its own age, it added.
Similar masks have also been worn by animal caretakers in other parts of the world.
In 2022, the South China Morning Post reported that keepers at China’s Wolong National Nature Reserve in Sichuan wear panda costumes smeared with bear faeces and urine.
The suits are to convince young pandas they are seeing their own kind and help them not become dependent on humans, the report said, while the faeces and urine are to mimic the smell of other pandas.
