Blue river running through a forest

Abundance tropical rainforest with foggy and river flowing through in the morning at national park Pro Photo

Summer skies in Ontario can prove to be very dramatic. NW winds off of Lake Huron, especially when drier air is coming in, sets the stage for moments like this. Using my Canon M6 Markll with the CANON EF-S 15-85mm f/3.5-5.6 IS USM lens, allows me to frame the sky off my 15th floor balcony with precision.

July 29, 2020 Summer skies in Ontario can prove to be very dramatic. NW winds off of Lake Huron, especially when drier air is coming in, sets the stage for moments like this. Using my Canon M6 Markll with the CANON EF-S 15-85mm f/3.5-5.6 IS USM lens, allows me to frame the sky off my 15th floor balcony with precision.

Grassy field with a mountain in the background

A green field under a cloudy blue sky photo – Free Moor crichel Image on Unsplash

White clouds in the sky photo – Free Blue Image on Unsplash

These foxes are the most common type of fox in the world and are the type that we find in urban areas and who come into our gardens in the UK. It used to be that grey wolves were the most common canines across the globe, however it has now been officially documented that the red fox has overtaken them.

Vulpes Vulpes (to give the red fox it’s latin name) are actually part of the dog family, albeit the smallest members and can grow up to around 5kgs when fully grown. Their life expectancy is quite wide ranging and can differ depending on whether their habitat is in the city or in the countryside. Many cubs don’t make it past 2 years old, although foxes held in captivity have been known to live for 15 years.

The mating season for foxes normally occurs in December and January and their mating rituals often involves blood curdling screaming as a form of communication. Red fox cubs (or kits) are born into a fox ‘earth’ (a den located in a secluded place) and usually only leave after a few weeks. The red fox cubs become independent at around 3 or 4 months and can start to produce offspring of their own after about 1 year.

The Red Fox is able to live in all sorts of adverse conditions and is very adaptable to it’s environment. Hence it’s success in surviving in urban areas, particularly in the cities of London and Bristol. They have been known to feed on lots of different prey which has helped their survival. Mice, voles and rats are common prey but they also earthworms as well as food scraps left out in gardens.

The red fox can often divide opinion in urban areas, with some people enjoying them and encourage the fox into their gardens, whilst others see them as a pest and seek to purchase various fox repellent products to keep the foxes away. In the countryside too, farmers often have a love-hate relationship with the red fox. On the one hand the fox is seen as a danger to chickens and lambs, on the other they keep rabbits and rodents off of farmland. Some common fox deterrent methods in the country are snares, fox traps and electric fences.

The red fox has undergone some harsh treatment throughout the ages through fox hunting, the fox fur trade and a recent backlash caused by a few high profile fox attacks on humans. The red fox is however a very durable creature and far from declining, their numbers seem to be steadily increasing, meaning that love them or hate them, the red fox is here to stay.

In India, Bangladesh and Nepal, the most common type of fox is the Bengal Fox. When compared with the common red fox, it is much slighter in appearance and has a more pointed nose along with a distinct black tip on it’s tail. Commonly weighing between 2-4kgs and with a life expectancy of around 11 years, the Bengal Fox enjoys hunting alone at either end of the day, out of the intense heat of it’s surroundings.

Like the red fox, the Bengal fox likes to dig a complicated network of tunnels to use as a hiding place and to give birth to and bring up their young. The litter varies between 3-6 cubs and the diet of the Bengal Fox is quite varied, ranging from rodents to insects to fruit.

Interestingly, studies have shown that the Bengal fox does not mark it’s territory with urine or faeces. This is unusual because defecation to claim an area is a very defining characteristic of the red fox, as many frustrated gardeners will testify to in urban areas!

Unfortunately the Bengal Fox is not thriving like it’s red counterparts. The threat of man is increasingly cutting the numbers of Bengal foxes due to both habitat destruction and hunting. The Bengal fox’s preferred areas to inhabit are open pieces of grassy land and scrub. Due to the increase of converting land for use in agriculture and a lack of land protection in the Indian subcontinent, the habitats of the Bengal fox are getting smaller and smaller, obviously causing a decrease in it’s numbers.

The foxes are also hunted for sports, for their fur in addition to some Indian tribes using fox teeth and tails in some medicines, believing them to have healing qualities. It is also not unknown for some people to catch the Bengal fox in order to eat it’s meat. Despite the Indian government issuing legislation in 1991 that forbids the hunting of Bengal foxes, because of the reasons given above, the legislation has had a limited impact and has failed to stop the decline in numbers.

Alas it appears that the Bengal fox is a member of the fox family that is not going to survive for too many more generations, as in addition to a lack of habitat and hunting, the fox also faces a threat from wolves, dogs and disease (namely rabies and canine distemper). One would hope the vulpes bengalensis will make a bit of a comeback, but at the moment it unfortunately looks like a decline that will not be reversed.

Also known as the Afghan Fox, Blanford’s Foxes are mainly found in the middle east. In actual fact, not too much is know about Blanford’s fox, but it tends to live in areas with little or no vegetation, having a light coloured coat that helps it blend into it’s arid and rocky surroundings.

There was a time when the Blanford’s Fox was considered seriously in danger of extinction, however it has since been downgraded on the ICUN Red List to be of relatively low risk of extinction.

The Latin name for the Blanford’s fox is Vulpes Cana and it gets it’s name from the English naturalist William Thomas Blanford, who spent a lot of time in the middle east and the fox was named in honour of him upon it’s discovery in 1877.

Blanford’s foxes have a cream coloured fur with black flecks, a black tail tip and black fur running alongside the nose. It also has very large pointed ears which would suggest it has excellent hearing. The foxes have a long bushy tail which is a similar length to their body and probably helps the Blanford’s fox to balance when it is negotiating large rocks and steep slopes in it’s mountainous habitat. The Blandford’s Fox has often been compared to more of a wild cat in appearance rather than to it’s canine origins.

The foxes stick to one partner throughout their lives but they hunt individually. As with the Red Fox, the mating season is normally around January, but pup litters are smaller at around 1-3 pups. The pups are fed on milk in their hidden dens until about the age of 2 months. After around 4 months, the Blanford’s fox will start to hunt alone.

Although humans are less of a threat to Blanford foxes, than to other types of foxes, they can be preyed upon by red foxes, wild cats and golden eagles. Because of the rough terrain they inhabit, the Blanford’s fox is usually unable to tunnel underground, instead resorting to gaps in rocks and naturally occurring caves, thus making them more vulnerable to predators.