Foxes Rule in Boulder

Fox Trot: A red fox in east Boulder looks up at the snow Sunday afternoon.

It is not unusual to see a fox in Boulder, but lately I seem to be running into them everywhere I go. We dropped a friend off over on the Hill just south of Columbia Cemetery a couple weeks ago and watched one trot across the street and into a neighbor’s yard. Our friend said it was a regular in the neighborhood. We watched one cross Sunset Avenue in front of our car on its way the golf course after visiting friends in Longmont. Several people on the Martin Acres email list have written of foxes in the neighborhood.

Last week I was riding my bicycle when I surprised one in a front yard at the intersection of Osage and Pawnee drives. It spotted me and began to run ahead across front yards along Pawnee Drive. It turned east on Shawnee Place, and I followed and lost it – actually it lost me – as it raced behind a fence into a backyard on Ricara Drive.

I first found this one munching on a mouse.

I knew that foxes were fleet of foot, but I was really impressed by how fast this little critter was in short bursts. It was like it was playing with me. I was disappointed that I couldn’t get my camera out in time to even get close to a photograph.

Sunday afternoon I was on Walnut Avenue about four p.m. getting ready to pull into the KGNU studio parking lot when I spied this fox just below the Foothills Parkway bridge. I stopped the car and came out with my camera in hand to try and catch it before it ran away, but this one just looked lazily down at me while chewing on a mouse. It was about three feet in length, and its white tail and black legs and ears identify it as a red fox, one of four fox species in Colorado. Gray foxes are about the same size as red ones, and swift foxes and kit foxes are smaller.

Foxes were almost killed to extinction, civilian casualties in the war humans waged against the wolf and the coyote. Like coyotes, foxes have adapted to life with humans. Foxes live near riparian areas, and Boulder Creek is only a couple hundred yards from here. This fox is well-known to KGNU folks, who see it (or others) on the bike path that leads down to the station close to where I saw it. There is obviously plenty of food in the area, judging from the mouse it was eating when I first saw it and the rabbit I watched running outside the KGNU studios a few minutes later.

The fox puts its nose into the snow before walking off.

As I shot pictures from about thirty feet, this one walked down the hill and seemed to be enjoying the snowflakes before it disappeared along the sidewalk under the bridge, its white tail sashaying behind.