Gray Foxes

We’ve been noticing a gray fox around where I work. There’s a meadow that is more or less kept mowed between my building and a horse paddock; it hosts a lot of wildlife, much of it prey for things like red-shouldered and Swainson’s hawks, coyotes, and the feral cats we seem never to quite get rid of.

About three years ago I spotted a gray fox near the railway tracks. It was my first ever near our house and I was elated. Seems like they’re moving in, because this fox we’ve been seeing recently is a vixen with two pups. They have a den under the building I work in.

This sketch is of the mother who climbed a toyon tree to get onto a sea container in order to put us under surveillance last night. We made very quick sketches and backed away, not wanting to put her under any more stress. The pups, two of them, played happily in the twilight… Hope they stay away from the road and that they get enough to eat.