NORMALLY I restrict wildlife to my Carter's Country daily column. But the fox is a bit special.

He came to town back in the second half of the 20th century. And on the whole he's found suburban life a lot easier than creeping over farmland.

Many town residents feed local foxes. And I've written about one which dined on a regular basis with a Torquay family. He actually sat on a chair at the table, taking food off a plate.

But it's not just the availability of food which makes an urban territory so attractive to the fox. The townie's generally sympathetic attitude to the animals help — plus the number of des res 'homes' that have maximum fox appeal. Those quarters range from garden and allotment sheds, churchyard corners and the grounds of hospitals, to garages, greenhouses, backyards and old cricket pavilions.

The breeding season peaks in December, January and February. But I've elaborated on this in the country column.

What concerns me is the way our species has treated so many wild animals as automata or the source of 'entertainment'. Often with a creature's death as the conclusion.

An old countryman described the animal as 'bloody vermin'. And if you have a farmyard or smallholding yard full of free range fowl you may subscribe to this point of view.

So the rural fox goes about the survival business in places like the South Devon farmland at the risk of being shot or trapped. Hunting has been consigned to history.

Carnivores often get a bad press. And the fox's reputation as an all-out killer is based on prejudice and mythology. But like many carnivores he is an opportunist scavenger, feeding on farm animal carcasses. And he also likes dung beetles, mushrooms, dead salmon, craneflies and blackberries.

The fox is neither good nor bad. He lives through his instincts and it's a mistake to judge animals from a human point of view. You know the labels — the 'good' work dog, the 'bad fox'; the 'cuddly' cat and the 'vicious' sparrowhawk which chops songbirds at the bird table.

The town fox is unlikely to get shotgun-blasted off an allotment garden. He gets out and about and I've seen him crossing dual carriageways, burgling bin bags opened by gulls, cleaning up pavement pizzas in Paignton's Station Square after the nightclubs turn-out, sniffing around the lane outside our front garden in Paignton and coming off the railway embankment into a local park.

Some are killed by traffic. But the life expectancy of townie vulpes vulpes is considerably greater than that of his country cousins.

According to HG Lloyd, in The Handbook of British Animals, male foxes predominate on Dartmoor. Only 10 per cent are three years old and four per cent a year older. Very few live to enjoy their sixth birthday.

Longevity is rare in wild creatures for obvious reasons. And one of the reasons is our species. Road accidents, poisoning, trapping and shooting reduce the odds of a country fox reaching old age.

On the other hand becoming old and decrepit wouldn't be pleasant in a rural environment, even if it were possible. There aren't many dentists prepared to provide false teeth for foxes. And a vixen with rheumatic joints would have more chance of becoming the next pope than pouncing on a rabbit.

Meanwhile the foxes from the woodland above the road not far from our house are welcome to join the local cats and hedgehogs at the backyard food bowls. Townie sentimentality? I think not. Peaceful co-existence is the term that comes to mind. But friends who keep free-range poultry don't share this view. And I'm not surprised.

Where wildlife is concerned, though, a so-called realistic attitude doesn't end at the suburbs. There the attitude is merely different and another example of evolution in human terms. And the more green places we conserve, in urban and suburban areas, the deeper our relationship with wildlife will grow — to the benefit of animals and birds living under our mercy.