It was interesting to read Mark Perryman's comments on my letter (November 30).

He said: "Someone firing a rifle in a city must be mad" and that I had a "shaky grasp of what constitutes a serious offence".

I said shooting an urban fox (which later died) in a city, is a serious offence - and it is. Even if it had taken someone's pet rabbit, as he suggests, the rabbit's owner still can't simply shoot the fox.

As I also wrote, secure containment protects livestock and pets alike. The hens Mr Perryman lost to a fox because of a gap in the fence underlines this.

As for him saying he would gladly shoot a fox to protect his hens, why should the fox lose its life because of his poor animal husbandry?

The mature woodland and fields which surround Mr Perryman are still helped by the fox, which keeps down rabbit and field vole numbers.

He also asks: "What keeps the fox in check?"

The answer is nature, which, through the wider ecosystem in which the fox lives, controls its numbers, for example, through disease, how many cubs survive or the availability of food. And it has been doing this for years, long before man arrived on the scene.

Nature's wisdom makes hunting and shooting unnecessary. They have little effect on fox numbers anyway.

-Gloria Wheatcroft, co-ordinator, Inner-City Wildlife Concern, Brighton and Hove