John Holden

Good point. I was thinking only in terms of foraged wood.

Depends whether it's wood ash or coal ash. Wood ash spread thinly, coal ash put in a bin.

That situation pre-dates CRT and BWB and was introduced by the private canal companies.

"no one mentioned "wildly""

And if you have fox problem in your urban garden who do you call in to sort it. A pack of hounds with accompanying horses, a guy with a shot gun or the guy who will come and set himself up in your back bedroom with a rifle? You can do nothing precisely with a shotgun.

We were talking about controlling foxes, not wildly blasting wildlife out of the skies.

My information comes from a farm manager who was an avid fox hunter. He said that as a method of fox control hunting was a total waste of time and that when he had a fox problem on his farm he would take his rifle to a fox hole and with his rifle he could pick off individual foxes. I am talking about shooting to control foxes and not the random countryman who just happens to spot a fox on his perambulations.

With a rifle you can sit and wait until a fox stops in front of you and then you can shoot it. If you miss you miss and the fox goes about its business unaware. With a shotgun you miss, but a few pellets hit, the fox is injured and runs away to suffer a slow and lingering death.

No, too much chance of none fatal (immediately) injury.

So one painless bite and the fox is instantly dead!

That's why they use rifles. A good shot means instant death, not like being chased to exhaustion and then ripped apart by dogs. Have you ever seen a fox torn apart slowly?

Buy and learn to use a rifle just like any other farmer troubled by foxes.