Into the Light

Mom and Kit

Day 5 (4/17/25) 

We finally were able to get some daylight shots of the kits. They are growing so fast. We also got some video of them. It is so fun to watch them running around. I am not sure how far they stray from the den but the video camera is a little ways down the trail and they come running past that. I had been wondering how red they were getting? When the parents were carrying them around they were mostly gray. Now they are still grayer than the parents but are mostly red. In just a week’s time they have grown quite a bit and are now looking more like the parents. Every once and a while, we catch a picture of the parents bringing some tender morsel to the kits. In one series of shots you can see a little one dragging around what appears to be a bird carcass. It may be awhile before I get to check on them again.

Foxy

Grumpy

Make a Little Noise

Watching the Sunset

The Three

Wait Mom

And then there were three!

The Three Kits

Day 3 (4/15/25) 

We were so excited seeing two kits at the den but when we checked today there were actually three. I am not sure why we didn’t capture all three in the first set of pictures but apparently they were just never out all together. We were hoping to get a daytime shot of them to see how their color has changed but nothing as of yet. They are very active all night long, with around five hundred pictures in three nights, but as soon as the sun comes up they are gone. Tomorrow I am going to check the video camera and see what we have. I hope we get some good video footage of them frolicking around. It has been an exciting last couple of days.

Two Kits

Hanging Out

Good Morning

Good Night

Their Back!

 

First Kit Sighting

Day 3 (4/12/25) 

After three to four weeks without much activity at the den suddenly on April tenth they were back with the kits. We were so excited to see that the kits are now up and running around. They are still little fur balls about half the size of the adults right now. It appears that there are two of them. They haven’t made a daytime showing yet but at night they are out scampering around. The camera went from almost no fox pictures to over four hundred in a week’s time and it is mostly the kits. The other thing that we noticed is that now there are no other animals hanging around the den. I am setting one of the cameras on video to see if I can capture some of their antics.

Mom

Froliking 

Mom and Kit

Two Kits

Nosey Neighbors

Opossum

Day 2 (4/9/25) Nosey Neighbors It seems that the fox parents have moved the kits to a different den. We still see them running past this den but rarely see them stop. A friend had told us of another possible burrow but as of yet we have not found one. In the mean time there have been a lot of other visitors. Almost every night opossum and raccoons drop by sniff around and then go about their business. Last night we had an interesting capture on the video cam. An opossum snuffling its way to the camera suddenly grabs an animal from under the leaves and gobbles it down. At first I thought that it may have been a mouse but I am now thinking a salamander. You can see a long thin tail and rear legs before it gets chewed up and swallowed but the infra red camera makes identification hard. On a side note, I wasn’t sure whether to use Opossum or possum but it turns out that scientifically possums are much smaller, from Australia and closely related to kangaroos. We were kind of surprised that so many animals visit the area around the den. Almost every night there are at least some. They seem to have no fear of the fox, some actually sniffing around the den, perhaps because they aren’t currently living in it.

Bunny

Racoon

Squirrel

Woodcock