Buried Treasure?
Tuesday, 16. June 2009, 19:25:31
Energy is the currency of survival in the wild. In my last post, I was musing over flight distances - the fact that a fox will only use energy to run away if it feels that a human is closer than a running distance to a safe spot. But there other matters about energy - to be exact, how to ensure that one can obtain it from a regular food supply - to consider, and that is what's triggered my sudden interest in discount dog food 
Those of you who remember the Old Dogfox will know that he was an exceptionally human-tolerant fox who more or less did whatever he wanted, indifferent to me quietly watching him. As a consequence, I saw him cache surplus food on several occasions. Occasionally, it left him with a dirty nose!
This is one of his caches, buried and (somewhat) disguised with twigs.
Recently, I've been re-reading J. David Henry's wonderful book on the wilderness foxes of Prince Albert National Park, Saskatchewan (and incidentally I paid about £10 for it, not £120, but I digress!
) One of Henry's chief research angles was considering why foxes cache their food. It may seem obvious, but caching has become deeply ingrained in fox genes for good reason, and I've been wondering if his observations in the wild boreal will help me interpret fox idiosyncrasies here in the North Downs 
The salient points:
- Foxes have small stomachs and, unlike dogs and wolves, physically cannot eat large amounts of food in one go.
- It is prudent to take food whenever it is available, even if the fox isn't hungry, just in case hard times are around the corner.
- Leaving food unguarded (like I did with the dog food, deliberately) is probably not wise
Unfortunately, transport issues have prevented me from going back to that meadow to see just how much dog food is still uneaten (I scattered small chunks of it here and there) but really, it isn't necessary. The world is full of thieves
In Saskatchewan, foxes have to hide their hoardes from everything from bears and wolves to ravens. Here, I would surmise that they have two great enemies: magpies... (of course!)
...and other foxes.
Foxes have to bury their caches to disguise the scent, and disguise them to keep sharp-eyed birds away. Henry kept a log of the animals that stole from "caches" that he had set out without one of these safeguards. I'd like to do the same, but for that I need a working trail camera. This is something of a sore point because the three trail cams that I've owned to date have all met with very grim and premature demises, the most recent shutting itself down after being cached by Andrea (and I do see the irony of now having to buy another camera to study caching!) In any case, I hope the fourth one has better luck
I guess the final point about caching is that it isn't limited to food (and trail cams
) Leaving shoes outside anywhere near a fox is really asking for trouble, but some foxes take shoe-caching to desperate extremes. Hermitess recently sent me this news article about a German fox who had cached more than 100 shoes before being discovered! 
Those of you who remember the Old Dogfox will know that he was an exceptionally human-tolerant fox who more or less did whatever he wanted, indifferent to me quietly watching him. As a consequence, I saw him cache surplus food on several occasions. Occasionally, it left him with a dirty nose!
This is one of his caches, buried and (somewhat) disguised with twigs.
Recently, I've been re-reading J. David Henry's wonderful book on the wilderness foxes of Prince Albert National Park, Saskatchewan (and incidentally I paid about £10 for it, not £120, but I digress!
) One of Henry's chief research angles was considering why foxes cache their food. It may seem obvious, but caching has become deeply ingrained in fox genes for good reason, and I've been wondering if his observations in the wild boreal will help me interpret fox idiosyncrasies here in the North Downs The salient points:
- Foxes have small stomachs and, unlike dogs and wolves, physically cannot eat large amounts of food in one go.
- It is prudent to take food whenever it is available, even if the fox isn't hungry, just in case hard times are around the corner.
- Leaving food unguarded (like I did with the dog food, deliberately) is probably not wise
Unfortunately, transport issues have prevented me from going back to that meadow to see just how much dog food is still uneaten (I scattered small chunks of it here and there) but really, it isn't necessary. The world is full of thieves
In Saskatchewan, foxes have to hide their hoardes from everything from bears and wolves to ravens. Here, I would surmise that they have two great enemies: magpies... (of course!)
...and other foxes.
Foxes have to bury their caches to disguise the scent, and disguise them to keep sharp-eyed birds away. Henry kept a log of the animals that stole from "caches" that he had set out without one of these safeguards. I'd like to do the same, but for that I need a working trail camera. This is something of a sore point because the three trail cams that I've owned to date have all met with very grim and premature demises, the most recent shutting itself down after being cached by Andrea (and I do see the irony of now having to buy another camera to study caching!) In any case, I hope the fourth one has better luck
I guess the final point about caching is that it isn't limited to food (and trail cams
) Leaving shoes outside anywhere near a fox is really asking for trouble, but some foxes take shoe-caching to desperate extremes. Hermitess recently sent me this news article about a German fox who had cached more than 100 shoes before being discovered!
)
He was far too distant for comfortable photography, but I'm posting this anyway because I was glad to see him 
here are some more creatures of the great lone land.
) All of a sudden, I saw a young male fox standing by a hedge. And he wasn't just going to stand there looking pretty. Now where have we seen this behaviour before? 
WIDGETIZE