{"id":241947,"date":"2026-01-20T04:44:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-20T04:44:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/241947\/"},"modified":"2026-01-20T04:44:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-20T04:44:09","slug":"father-of-brave-cancer-fighter-attacked-by-fox-north-of-melbourne","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/241947\/","title":{"rendered":"Father of brave cancer fighter attacked by fox north of Melbourne"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The father of brave cancer fighter Tyler Fishlock has been taken to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.9news.com.au\/hospitals\/13\" target=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"hospital\">hospital<\/a> after he was attacked by a fox on his property north of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.9news.com.au\/melbourne\" target=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"Melbourne\">Melbourne<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Paramedics rushed to a homestead in Romsey, 60 kilometres north of Melbourne in the Macedon Ranges,\ufeff about 6am after reports of an &#8220;animal related incident&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>Brad Fishlock, 51, had come to the aid of one of his baby alpacas as it was being attacked by a fox.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/https:\/\/prod.static9.net.au\/fs\/2e0ff21e-4753-4aa2-bd9e-91c2fd922c2c.png\"   alt=\"Brad, Tyler and Georgette Fishlock.\"\/>Brad, Tyler and Georgette Fishlock. (Nine)<\/p>\n<p>The fox then attacked Mr Fishlock, sinking its teeth into the inside of his thigh.<\/p>\n<p>Advanced life support paramedics treated him for lower body injuries and he was taken to Northern Hospital in a stable condition.<\/p>\n<p>He underwent emrgency surgery on a deep wound on his leg this afternoon.\ufeff<\/p>\n<p>Paramedics who attended the scene at the time that he was lucky not to have severed an artery.<\/p>\n<p>Exotic wildlife veterinarian Dr Nicole Su said attacks on humans by foxes were &#8220;really out of the ordinary&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/https:\/\/prod.static9.net.au\/fs\/efcaeddf-1117-4864-be5c-3f2029eae637.png\"   alt=\"\"\/>The man was taken to the Northern Hospital. (Google Street View)<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Unfortunately we are seeing [foxes] encroaching onto more and more urban areas and we&#8217;re having more sightings as well, and what we are seeing is they are getting bolder,&#8221; she said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;This is the first time I&#8217;ve heard of such a bad attack on a person, but I have heard of chickens snatched out of their coops, rabbits snatched out of their enclosures.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>She warned anyone who encounters aggressive behaviour from the animals to report it to their local council.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/https:\/\/prod.static9.net.au\/fs\/0b63252d-6dea-420e-b2d1-d76ab7997c6a.png\"   alt=\"Exotic wildlife veterinarian Dr Nicole Su said she had never heard of a fox attack on a human before.\"\/>Exotic wildlife veterinarian Dr Nicole Su said she had never heard of a fox attack on a human before. (Nine)<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We are really careful to warn pet owners that this is a really big risk, even if you&#8217;re living in the inner city of Melbourne, we still do hear it happening with these guys,&#8221; she said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;If they are, let&#8217;s say, coming into your backyard, or if you&#8217;ve got pets that you&#8217;re worried about, lights and noises, those are gonna be the best things to scare them away.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>9News met the Fishlock family in 2006 when Tyler Fishlock lost his sight in both of his eyes to cancer before his fourth birthday.<\/p>\n<p>Tyler went on to face another two cancer battles.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The father of brave cancer fighter Tyler Fishlock has been taken to hospital after he was attacked by&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":241948,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[111,139,69,147,406],"class_list":{"0":"post-241947","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-new-zealand","9":"tag-newzealand","10":"tag-nz","11":"tag-science","12":"tag-wildlife"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/241947","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=241947"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/241947\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/241948"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=241947"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=241947"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=241947"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}