The dead fox found by a road on the Wadden Sea island of Texel was shot and probably dumped there as a joke, a spokesman for local animal sanctuary Ecomare said on Tuesday.

Foxes are not native to Texel and a fox population could pose a danger to rare birds on the island, biologists said after the find on Monday. There have been rumours of foxes on the island for over a year.
But x-rays show the fox was hit from close range by at least 40 pellets, which indicate it was killed in a cage and dumped there, Ecomare said. The organisation now assumes the fox was brought to the island from the mainland and dumped.
In 2008 the mysterious arrival of 10 red deer on the Wadden Sea island of Terschelling surprised and puzzled local biologists. The deer, who were all later shot dead, had apparently been smuggled to the island in horse trailers.