Bridgewater woman recounts fox attack

BRIDGEWATER - Shirley Doyle was down on her front lawn on Saturday, knocked over by an angry, and probably rabid, fox that had sprinted from the woods near her home while she was out for a walk. It had lunged at her ankle, and now it was growling and gnawing its sharp teeth into her lower left leg, even as the 71-year-old woman repeatedly hit it across the head with her shoe and screamed for help. Doyle thought she would faint from the excruciating pain, or even bleed to death.

Next door, Norman Millikan, a lanky 72-year-old who in recent years had undergone three heart surgeries and now has a pacemaker, was watching the movie "Dial M For Murder" with his wife. The film was reaching its climactic end, but something was bugging Millikan. He'd forgotten to lock his pickup truck. So he got up and walked outside.

Millikan at first thought the cries he heard were sounds of glee from one of Doyle's many grandchildren. Then he saw the fox, and he saw his Edgewood Drive neighbor writhing on her side, desperately trying to free herself from the growling animal.... continue



FOR THE RECORD: "Foxes can be petted, but not tamed" remember that!