The Fox Den 4

  "When a reporter enters the room, your privacy ends and his begins." ~ Warren Beatty

Gentle Readers and Loved Ones,

Ok, so it’s an old quote from Beatty, way before all the modern foofaraw about gender ID, ‘cuz Ol’ Warren, did, in fact assume that all reporters are male.  Take it up with him, not me and work with me on the truth behind this un-PC quote.  Because, I have been and plan to continue invading the poor fox’s privacy on an ongoing basis.

A few nights ago, Ann and I went out and mounted the cam to a fairly big ash tree right next to the southern fox hole.  We are pretty convinced that the fox has a fairly extensive warren under the root balls of several trees and the north hole and the south hole connect up. 

I managed to mount the cam too close to the hole and aimed too high, so I only got a few good videos.  We left the cam up for two nights. 

Right after sunset the first night, the fox buzzed right by the cam without seeming to even notice it.

 Then she came back and I got this video that causes me to conclude that it’s ‘she’.

 The reason I’ve been making a big deal of her gender is that I surmise – here in late winter – it won’t be long until reproductive season comes around and there will be some fox kits.  I’m trying to decide what we are going to do about that with this blog.

The next night, the coyote came calling again.

 

On this second coyote video, it appears to me that the coyote noticed the camera and acted skittish.  I inconclusively googled “can coyotes see in infrared” and did not get much of an answer.  But I also made a discovery on the cam itself. 

When this cam senses motion, it then evidently looks to see how bright the natural light is.  If the light is under the threshold for human visible spectrum, it lights up the infrared spot light.  When it does that a group of red LED’s come on in the front of the camera that I assume emit red light in the visible range and also the infrared. 

I surmise the coyote saw these red lights and was a little spooked by them.  

 On that happy note, I remain,

Dad/Geoff