Thieving foxes swipe shoes, newspapers from porches in Media, Delaware County

MEDIA, Pennsylvania (WPVI) -- The mystery of missing shoes in Media, Delaware County has been traced back to a skulk of sly creatures.

For the past two months, neighbors have been catching foxes on their surveillance cameras scurrying through their yards. One couple says they end up with items like shoes, newspapers, dog toys, and sports equipment in their yard nearly every day.

Adrienne Meil caught one fox on her security camera running through her yard with a flip flop.

"This started in May. May 13th I found the first video," she said.

There's a hole in Meil's fence and a trail through her yard. The crimes happen like clockwork: every night at dusk.

"It's just amazing because the Ring video goes off every single night and I send them to all of our neighbors all around us. It's just the craziest thing. They're so majestic and I'm just obsessed," she said.

Cute as they may be, they are preying on personal property. We've all been warned this could happen.

"Swiper no swiping, yes!" said Amy Acquarola, quoting the popular children's show, Dora the Explorer.

Every day she and her husband, Tom, find a new surprise in their yard.

"The New York Times, this morning was the Wall Street Journal, so they're very sophisticated reads," joked Tom.

"At first we were like, OK, a random shoe, and then when it started happening every couple of days, we put two and two together, we knew it was the baby foxes," said Amy.

In two months, they've found about 20 pairs of shoes. They post the bounty on Facebook and leave them on a sign in their yard

As for how far the goods have traveled, "I don't know because we've only been able to reunite about 50% of the shoes, so I think some of them are coming from quite a distance," said Amy.

Action News did ask animal control if the neighbors should be concerned, they said no. As long as you leave a fox alone, it won't bother you.