After escaping a fur farm alive, Zoe – a fox with beautiful, silvery fur – lucked out to say the least.
Zoe is known as a “pastel fox,” which is what happens when a platinum fox and a white-faced fox cross-breed to create fur with a silvery sheen. A combination that would not happen naturally.
At a fur farm in the Netherlands, an early death was inevitable for Zoey but in 2012, the pastel fox was lucky and escaped.
When Zoe was just a year old, she was rescued and brought to Tierart. Run by Four Paws International, the sanctuary was designed mainly for big cats in Germany.
With plenty of sunlight, fresh and nutritious food – Zoe was able to live a life that was safe and conducive to her growth – a life she would have never been able to experience had she still had been trapped at the fur factory.
But Zoe’s life was not done changing quite yet. In a nearby town in 2016, local residents spotted an animal they couldn’t quite place who would meander throughout the neighborhood. Residents noted the animal looked like a dog but had silvery brown fur that no one had seen before.
The dog-like animal was soon captured and taken to Tierart. But the animal was not a dog, he was in fact — a pastel fox, just like Zoe. He was named Frodo by rescuers and was noted to be very friendly with people, which allowed rescuers to understand where exactly he may have come from.
“Since the coloring of a pastel fox is not found naturally in the wild and Frodo seemed to be used to people, the Tierart team suspected Frodo was kept as a pet and simply abandoned,” site manager at Tierart, Florian Eiserlo, shared in a statement with the Dodo. “Unfortunately, there are still breeders on the internet who advertise pastel foxes as exotic pets … We were happy to offer him a forever home.”
Both of the pastel-colored foxes are considered rare, captive-bred foxes but are still very territorial. That being said, the people at the sanctuary did not want to rush the relationship between Frodo and Zoe. What they did instead was put Frodo in an enclosure that shared a fence with Zoe’s home, that way, the two could take their time seeing and smelling each other.
“We planned to slowly introduce the foxes,” wrote Four Paws. “We found them cuddled together through a fence separating their enclosures.”
After only one night, the two were found in the morning cuddling right next to each other through the fence. The staff then realized how close the two wanted to be and moved the two foxes in together.
“What are the odds that Zoe, a fox initially brought to Tierart from another country, and Frodo, a fox that was kept by humans and later abandoned, would find one another?” head of communications for Four Paws USA, Claire LaFrance said.
Zoe and Frodo have been two peas in a pod since. The pair adores sunbathing together, playing together, cuddling together and exploring their newly expanded home together.
It is known that in captivity, foxes are able to live as long as 14 years and because Zoe is 7 years old and Frodo is 4 years old, it seems the two will have many full years in front of them.
“We hope these two will have a long and happy life together,” Eiserlo said.
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