The calls and texts began coming in May.
“Hello, thank you for calling the Wildlife Center of Virginia. This is Sarah. How can I help you?"
A fox in Albemarle County was running around – wearing what looked like a big green plastic collar.
"So I thought, at first, it was going to be a plastic flower pot that the bottom was out of."
Sarah Driscoll began tracking the critter as more calls came in. Advice was offered on how to catch the animal and bring it to Waynesboro for treatment, but foxes are notoriously tough to trap.
"Somebody else called and reported finding a baby with an adult near, and the adult had the p0lastic on it, so we thought it was going to be mom, because it was taking care of the kit."
Haley Taylor and her kids – 7-year-old Brooks and 5-year-old Elise – were also concerned.
"My kids became involved, because we were seeing the babies, and it just became this thing: If we can help, we want to help."
She texted her neighbors, asking them to be on the lookout, and one replied.
"The fox that you saw, with the collar, has been sleeping on my porch the past few nights."
They offered the animal dog food and pepperoni but couldn’t lure it into a live trap.
Another neighbor offered water and kind words when she saw the fox.
“I said, ‘Are you okay little fox?’ and he just walked around me – didn’t look like he was rabid, but you could tell the poor thing was really suffering.”
She, too, called for advice and was asked to trap the animal and bring it in.
“My son happened to be working right across the street from the Wildlife Center, and he picked up a trap.”
But she was disappointed when another fox approached the trap and got into a scrap with the family’s cat.
“They were fighting. I literally had to break them up with a broom.”
Then, more than a month later, Driscoll says another woman arrived in Waynesboro with the fox.
“He came in in a live trap, and they sedated him and that was all it took. They were able to cut it off, and thankfully It was not too snug to cause damage, but snug enough not to slip off naturally.”
The mysterious collar was identified.
"It was part of a storm drain."
And Driscoll was surprised to learn the truth about the fox.
"He is actually a boy. A lot of times father foxes will stay and take care of kits as well, so he was just being a really good dad."
The animal was returned to its neighborhood and scampered off blissfully naked again.
