Never Before Heard Call in the Night.... Fox (wav. file). Update: Tracks Update2: Saw Fox!

[speckledhen]

This is the call I heard:

http://www.angelfire.com/ar2/thefoxden/farcry.wav

Took me ages to even be able to place the sound at all as possibly canine and not avian. Just never heard this particular call, but I realized that foxes make all sorts of bizarro sounds. At first, I thought it was one of the roosters making a very loud and strange alarm call, then it was so regular and there was zero sound coming from the coop over the baby monitor. They were silent and probably scared.

And this animal was within my fenced perimeter, very close to the house and coops, which does not at all surprise me. A 4-5' livestock fence is no match for a coyote or fox and was never meant to be, only to keep my chickens in and most roaming domestic dogs from being able to just run across our place with ease.

I sent my DH out with a powerful flashlight to be 100% sure that no one was left outside (after he commented that he hoped no one was left out there

). He didn't find anything, of course, and the animal shut up and I guess left.

Yeah, DH went out to look with a flashlight, then made a joke about being carried down the driveway by a bear, yelling, "Cyn, you were wrong, it's a bear!". I said he was silly. No bear would exit down the driveway. HAHAHA!

Early this morning before all the fog had burned off, someone fired a shot and all the roosters down the hill at the Weavers place on the corner were going off like crazy. Bet he shot at that fox.

 

[boskelli1571]

If you have oodles of time on your hands, try youtube. I just spent 30 minutes on there trying to place the sound for you - no luck! Sue

 

[speckledhen]

Thank you for doing that! But to clarify-the wav. file was not one I made, but one I found on the web that is one of the fox's many vocalizations. That is why I'm positive it is was a fox. I'm going to search youtube like you did, too, though, so I can get more verification. I've had a fox's den on our property way back when I had my original flock of ten hens plus my rooster, Hawkeye, and my yard was not fully fenced. She never bothered my own chickens 200 ft from her den, but I found someone's BR's feathers at the mouth of one of the entrances (there were two entrances to the den).



Found this on youtube. If you look at 1:56, it shows a fox in white winter coat and plays the howl. That is it

 

[chickengeorgeto]

Over 40 years ago two good old boys of my acquaintance decided to spot light a deer that was raiding their mama's garden. While they keep watch over their mama's pea patch a rutting red fox started calling. These two brave soles abandoned their gun on the spot and beat a hasty retreat. The next morning I had to accompany them to retrieve their spotlight and gun because they were certain that someone had been murdered in their mama's garden the night before.

 

[speckledhen]

Over 40 years ago two good old boys of my acquaintance decided to spot light a deer that was raiding their mama's garden. While they keep watch over their mama's pea patch a rutting red fox started calling. These two brave soles abandoned their gun on the spot and beat a hasty retreat. The next morning I had to accompany them to retrieve their gun because they were certain that someone had been murdered in their mama's garden the night before.

Haha, that is so funny!

Seriously, though, foxes have the craziest variety of vocalizations. Coyotes yipping just sound like a kennel full of dogs got out, or close to it. I've heard the pack quite a lot this year. I was familiar with the fox bark, but this howl was new to me.

 

[boskelli1571]

That's just too funny!! Although we have a few Fishers' around here and when they 'scream' it sounds like someone is being murdered! If I had been in the woods at night when I first heard them, I probably would have peed my drawers...........

 

[speckledhen]

Thankfully, we do not have fishers way down here! Got enough to worry about without that giant weasel prowling around.

 

[aart]

Cool, thanks for posting. Don't think I've ever heard the howl either.
Never forget the first time I heard a bark tho, scared the poop out of me!
Got out the spotting light and there was a gray fox 60 feet from my back window standing on a downed tree trunk barking..... sounded more like screaming.
Light didn't really deter it either, so II was able to SEE it make that gawd awful noise, it came back every day or so for a month or so.

 

[sn0wwhite]

Ok, just last night my daughter showed me this video and I didn't really get it until I read this thread.

 

[speckledhen]

OMG, THAT IS HYSTERICAL! No way I'd ever have seen that unless I posted this thread. Love it, lol! Unexpected chuckle this morning.