Luke Ogden has been an animal and wildlife lover for years.
Growing up in Pennsauken, he preferred the great outdoors to video games. He had a pet snake and a menagerie of animals. For a while, he was the guy who gave talks from inside the tank of what is now the Adventure Aquarium in Camden. He had a dog walking business, and he was president of his high school's ecology club.
Two winters ago, Ogden, now 42, saw his first red fox, living in a den under a pile of old leaves and suffering from advanced mange, and it stopped him in his tracks.
"There was no fur on it. Literally, it looked like a hairless cat," Ogden said. "It was like leather."
He spent the next 10 days devising different methods -- it's true what they say; foxes are very clever and quick -- to try to catch the fox and get it help for the tortuous condition caused by sarcoptic mites burrowed into its skin.
When he finally caught the red fox, it was too late. The animal died on the way to a wildlife rehabilitation center.
"But just seeing that fox in that condition, and knowing it had suffered like that for four to six months to get to that point, that was a game changer for me," Ogden said. "That's what made me decide to do what I'm doing. Because no animal deserves to go through that."
In October 2023, the South Jersey resident started An Itch in Time -- Mangy Fox Rescue, a nonprofit organization dedicated to the difficult and time-consuming task of capturing red foxes suffering from mange and bringing them to licensed wildlife rehabilitators for treatment.
He and his several volunteers, including his wife Carollyn, a massage therapist, don't get paid for the work they do. He keeps 12 trapped locations with cameras that communicate to his smartphone all hours, day or night, when an animal has been taken to one of the kennel-like tracks. Sometimes it's a raccoon or a skunk, and he'll release it.
But if it's a red fox, it will be brought to a wildlife rehab or, if it seems healthy or its mange is slight, his group will administer an antiparasitic medication.
Since An Itch in Time began, Ogden said they've caught over 90 foxes, most with mange, that have been saved.
"He's great," said Suzanne Fenton, an Atlantic County-based rehabilitator whose Wildlife Aid Inc. is licensed by New Jersey. "I find it amazing that he just did all this, all on his own without any training or anything."
According to NJ's Department of Environment Protection's Division of Fish and Wildlife, sarcoptic mite mange is the biggest killer of red foxes and coyotes in the state. Highly contagious, it can be possibly spread to domestic dogs and people, according to the agency.
In Pennsylvania, biologist Thomas Keller of the Pennsylvania Game Commission said mange has been present in the state's red fox population for decades, but he doesn't believe it is significant or growing. Overall these animals "have had a very stable, healthy population for many years," especially in southeast Pennsylvania, he said.
Keller did not know of any nonprofit groups like An Itch in Time operating in his state, but he was aware of unlicensed private citizens attempting to treat foxes with mange, which is illegal in Pennsylvania. One such advocate in Northwest Philadelphia was written about recently in the local environmental publication Grid Magazine.
For red foxes in the wild, the Jersey advocates find, sarcoptic mange is often a death sentence -- and a horrible one.
"They're constantly itching, and it never gets any better," Fenton said. "It's miserable. It's one of the worst ways to die."
In the winter, it's even worse.
"Foxes don't mind cold weather," she said. "When they're healthy, their tails are huge and fluffy, and that's their blanket. It's kind of like a scarf. They wrap it around their body. They keep warm. But when they lose their fur on their tail, they don't have that protection."
Karen Cooper, whose Cooper's Fox Den is a Manalapan rehabilitation operation, is also fan is Ogden's efforts.
"He's just wonderful," said Cooper, who is also licensed by the state.
She believes loss of habit by over development is lessening red fox life span in the state and why some people say they are seeing foxes with mange.
"The fields are where red foxes live. They're taking away their territory," Cooper said. "So now you put the same amount of foxes in a smaller area with more stress, and sarcoptic mange can show itself. An animal that's stressed out has a lower immune system."
While red foxes aren't aggressive animals, they are being driven to live closer to humans, which results in them they losing more of their natural prey. Tension results when they seek out some domestic animals like chickens, and Ogden said people lose out on foxes as effect rodent population controllers. But a red fox with sarcoptic mange is often too weak to hunt.And people like Ogden and the rehabilitators will tell you they are beautiful, interesting animals. Several generations of foxes will often use the same den site. Vixens will tend to their kits, while the fathers (the males are called dogs) will hunt.
And they are very smart. Ogden, who lives in Haddon Township and works in wasp and hornet nests removal from people's homes in the warm months, has gone through all sorts of trial and error, figuring out how to lure the red foxes.
That includes what food works best as bait. So far, hot dogs coated with barbecue sauce or apricot glaze is the winner.
"The foxes love sweet things," he said.
Plus the moisture in the hot dogs help keep them from drying out, and the sauce creates a barrier to help prevent flies from laying their eggs on the meat.
Last October, Ogden's team held the For Fox Sake Fall Tattoo Fundraiser to help An Itch in Time fund its work. Ogden got a big fox -- about an 8-incher -- tattooed on his right arm. He says he'd love it if he work on red fox rescue full time. He would also like to work to lessen the use of certain rodent poisons which he suspects weaken the foxes' immune systems. And he would like to get more people inspired by the cause.
"The ultimate goal is to get them back home, feeling better, being healthier," he said. "This way, there's hope that they're able to breed more foxes. It's all a numbers game. The more foxes that go back out, the more likely we'll have more for future generations."
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