One canine outfoxes another, simply

My wife and I were walking the dog down a seldom-used trail in one of the wilder corners of town a few weeks ago. We marveled over the invisible “tracks in the sand” that led the dog on his endlessly windy way.

If you and I could only see what nearly any member of the dog family can smell, I think our minds would be thoroughly blown. Scientists place the dog’s sense of smell at somewhere between 10,000 and 100,000 times that of our own. Boil that figure down to a walk through the woods and Frankie was smelling things along that trail we could only dream of seeing. Each of the creatures that had traveled this same path over the course of the past two, 12 or even 24 hours was still abundantly evident to the dog’s all-knowing nose.

Frank’s wasn’t the only canine snout in operation that morning, however, and we were alerted to the other by way of a single, sharp, snappy “yip.” Our dog, deep in the throes of nasal nirvana, missed the audible, but Kristin and I instantly turned our heads toward the source of the sound, and after a moment, the vision became clear.

“There’s a red fox lying in there,” I whispered, doing my best not to spook the motionless orange puff that lay in a singular beam of sunlight penetrating a scrubby successional stand of silver maple and cottonwood.

“Oh my goodness, is it even alive?” Kristin asked, but just as the last syllable left her lips, her question was answered by a pair of black triangles that poked above the doughnut of rusty fur.

“Well, I’m pretty sure he knows we're here,” I said. “Now let’s see if we can get out of his domain without Frank falling downwind of him; otherwise the chase will be on.”

We safely extracted ourselves and the hound without flushing the fox, which was the best outcome for all.

Contrary to what many folks believe, it’s not necessarily abnormal to see a red fox during the day, especially at this time of year when food is scarce. Furthermore, finding a fox sleeping in the middle of the day takes little more than really good luck and slightly above average skills of observation. A small red dog stands out pretty well on the snow-white canvas of a brushy meadow.

That the fox didn’t take off running was likely a function of him having smelled Frankie before the dog smelled him. That fox had us made the minute we hit the trail and decided it would go with a strategy of stealth rather that flight. To run would have shed a trail of scent as vivid as a plume of smoke from an acrobatic airplane, and Frank would’ve followed it (whether I liked it or not) like a flying ace in a dog fight.

Red fox are comfortable neighbors to the urban edge. Smart and stealthy, they live right under our noses, picking off chipmunks, rodents, rabbits and squirrels, leaving nothing but tiny cat-like footprints as passing evidence. If times get tough, they’re not above getting into your trash or stealing kibble from an outside pet bowl.

Much smaller and far less noticeable than their next-size-up cousin the coyote, fox actually benefit by melding into the fabric of our neighborhoods. The coyote, which is apt to capture and kill a red fox on competitive principle alone, holds greater advantage the further from civilization the pair exist.

Red fox mating season is soon upon us, and monogamous pairs will set up housekeeping in the next month or so with mother doing all the work of preparing a den, which is typically a loamy dugout with a southern exposure. Father fox remains in the picture by bringing food to the den for the nursing vixen and the kits as they ween. Both parents then participate in baby fox boot camp, teaching the young to effectively stalk and pounce right up until the family unit disperses sometime in October.

If you have comments on this column or questions about the natural world, write The Rail Trail Naturalist, P.O. Box 170, Fredericksburg, OH 44627, or email jlorson@alonovus.com. You also can follow along on Instagram @railtrailnaturalist.