UPDATE for 5272020. Good news. A young male has been spotted dancing around on the property in the morning and dusk hours ( has had a barking match with my cat also) ... too swift to capture him on video. It's possibly a kit of this female as she had been lactating (possibly weren't infected?). As far as speculation please keep in mind i am only the videographer and this was so titled for the authority involved who happens to have decades of experience. Leave me out of it. My only intent was to capture a rare close proximity encounter of a wild animal on video. I did not enjoy seeing it get shot, and I am NOT THE SHOOTER.
Stages of disease
The first stage is a one to threeday period characterized by behavioral changes and is known as the prodromal stage.
The second stage is the excitative stage, which lasts three to four days.
The THIRD STAGE is the paralytic or dumb stage and is caused by damage to motor neurons.

Update 71218 **Attention ladies and gentleman** of the new internet... if you read the description you can appropriately dive to the depths of "common sense cyberspace protocol" to a point without fully having to ascertain that this was filmed (while waiting) before the proper "killing authorities" had arrived. Stop. **** thank you.

This poor mother. I left the video mostly raw with some maximum stabilizing so you could see the symptoms that they exhibit. I could have chosen a few minutes, but I wanted to express how harrowing this disease is. If you have it in your heart, try to get through all 17 minutes. Often times when you see me get up or move the camera, it's out of fear because she was coming right up to me. Pay no attention to the people in the background... Do not approach, pet, or come into contact with their saliva. I know this seems obvious as adorable and rare as close contact is with them, (everyone seems to try to approach or actually "pet" them) but do not. I've had contact with raccoons and close feedings with skunks, but these were healthy nocturnal juveniles.. hungry as ever.

A wildlife expert was dispatched and on the spot said she was rabid. The fox (unfortunately) was destroyed on the spot via pellet gun. I can't say i agree with this method of putting an animal down, but more importantly it was bagged and thrown away by the police rather than positively having it tested for rabies by a biologist. Living or dead.

The health department will only issue mailers if someone is bitten (a likely fatal wound if not treated within 2436 hours). This is the dumb active world we live in. They do not understand mammalian diseases or the potential hidden outbreak. For them it's not worth the cost of paper to be proactive about a disease that kills. It is not worth it for the police to allow the scientific community to collect specimens for review. As sad as it was to watch her struggle as well as getting her eye shot out, the real tragedy is the lack of human involvement in education, prevention and control.


The first thing it attacks is muscle control, particularly in the hips and legs. Respiratory then becomes difficult..