Fox?...

                A couple of weeks ago, Stephanie and I arrived at the farm… I guess I should explain that we do not actually live on the farm where I grew up, but instead live a crazy commute away, a whopping 1.2 miles in road distance, but I digress… and she spotted a fox on part of the driveway. I was not privy to this sight, since the driveway is circuitous with various buildings that act as barriers to view point in a manner I do not wish to describe here, and whereas my eyes were on the path to… parking our vehicle… I did not get the chance to view the fox just mentioned that was sitting on the driveway behind one of the various buildings.

                For Stephanie, it was another new creature to view on the farm. For me, I am quite familiar with foxes, and I quite respect them. When she mentioned she saw a fox, I experienced a sense of reassurance, if you will, for there has been an awful large number of rabbits eating the produce on the farm. Foxes, for me, are a good thing…

                Over the following days, twice I witnessed this “fox” sitting on the paved driveway, at the low point where there is heavy and dense vegetation, as in trees and thickets to one side and mowed grass on the other. What a strange looking fox, I thought. But, since the “fox” quickly disappeared once I was seen, I did not think much more about it, other than, that is, that the rabbit issue might soon be a non-issue…

                This Sunday, I was mowing the large grass portion of Field 8. To explain a little, Field 8 borders Hughes Shop Road, and this border includes at least a ten foot drop from the road to the somewhat level field property, where a deer fence has been erected to keep out… well, at this point, the only creatures it seems to sometimes keep out are deer. I will continue. A truck rumbled up Hughes Shop Road from the Pleasant Valley direction rapidly. The truck just mentioned must have startled the creature of our focus, because as I approached the road in my mowing pattern, that “fox” reappeared… on the inside of the fence, as though that fence did not even exist!, but I have digressed again…

                Anyway, the creature of our focus was seemingly pinned between the rumbling rapid vehicle on Hughes Shop Road and the slow moving riding mower located down below in Field 8, as it is known for organic certification purposes, etc., etc.

                I first noticed the creature as I had passed its “pinned” position, but I noticed it peripherally. I was startled, actually by the movement of the creature. At first it sought shelter under the mulberry tree branches brought down by lightning just the week before. Nonetheless, I noticed a certain amount of un-certainty in the creature’s movements. There was hesitation, that was for sure. Whatever the creature was, it was not used to humans, and I can relay honestly that its actions were not familiar to me.

                When I witnessed the creature dart into the mulberry tree cover, I expected extreme fear, something like what a rabbit would reveal. I mowed as close as I could to the downed tree branches, and the creature did not flee… and I was amazed. I paused on the mower just next to the downed tree and stared at the shaded creature amidst that downed… now underbrush. It did not move. From my perspective, it appeared that is merely stared at me dispassionately. That position was held for a couple of minutes. Since no fear was sensed from the creature, and, well, my interest was piqued, I proceeded on my mowing course.

As I mowed around the downed branches, my path eventually led to the other side of the creature’s hiding place, and all the while, I was looking at this mammal eye to eye. When I reached the west side of the downed tree, it moved out from beneath its shelter and headed toward the east border heavily consumed by briars and other brush. Despite being somewhat obstructed by the downed tree, I was struck by the odd coloring of the creature’s fur, that and the thinness of its torso. Oh, yeah, and the tail. The color of the fur was mostly a reddish brown, but had mottled specks of white and grey intermixed. This was no fox, I thought, for I had seen plenty of foxes in my life… and the most glaring point was its straight tail. Foxes have bushy tails.

At that point in the adventure, if you will, I was beyond intrigued. Intuitively, I knew what creature lurked in that field that day, but I needed new proof. For most of the last decade I have heard rumors about these creatures in the immediate area, which I always equated to “urban myths”. The thing is, those who mentioned seeing them were those who would have also seen Big Foot and UFOs. I guess the main glaring fallacy of my statement is that those stories would more accurately be termed “rural myths”. Anyway, as the legends grew about the “return” of these creatures to our area, the only evidence I have witnessed over the years are large paw prints in a couple of the fields I had freshly tilled. The only creatures I have personally known to have such large paw prints in our region have been dogs, and since no dogs are on the field… that left two possibilities… One would be a wolf, and that is definitely not happening at this point!... The second… coyote!

As luck would have it for me that day, it would seem my slow approach to the strange creature seemed to allow its own curiosity over me to keep it from darting away into the brush. It left the cover of the downed mulberry tree, walked toward the east corner of the field, then sat and watched me as I mowed the remainder of that field. I made sure not to mow too close, so as not to startle the creature, and my method worked. As a result, for about ten to fifteen minutes, we were able to study each other…

After visually analyzing the creature for several minutes, there was little doubt that the creature was a coyote, albeit a somewhat young one. It was the size of a large fox, but again, foxes do not look like the creature I saw. The second thing that struck me was the creature’s curiosity. From my experience with other mammals, it is only in the youth stage that they are “curious”. Adults know better. By my estimation, that coyote was a teenager. It did not know what to think of me, and it felt no hostility from me, so… it sat and watched me. I have had situations with rabbits where…

Okay, I’ll relate this one. There is/was a rabbit that bunkered down by the greenhouses. That is NOT a good place for a rabbit to find a home. Nonetheless, it did, and it was a very young rabbit. By the time this rabbit entered that area, there was little it could damage, and since it was so young, I let it be. Anytime I approached the greenhouses and saw the rabbit, my movements were slowed and I showed no hostility. One time, when I was talking on my cell phone a month later, the rabbit appeared from beneath one of the benches that holds the transplants. Within a short period of time, the rabbit was… playing with me. I stood still as the rabbit darted straight at me, then stopped and retreated…at least a half dozen times. At one point, it actually ran over my boot! I would be amazed by this, but I have witnessed such actions by young mammals before…

So, the young coyote sat and watched me… And I watched the young coyote… I photographed the creature in my mind… Relentless as I am for accuracy, the understanding that the mind is quite a deceptive organ lingered. The pictures that I pulled up under “coyotes in Maryland” later that night revealed quite a display… of wolves, full grown coyotes, foxes, and sports teams whose mascots are coyotes. But there was one photo that I saw that revealed the same pointed ears, the same mottled fur coat, along with the same emaciated-looking torso. There was no doubt that my visitor that day was a coyote. In my over forty years of existence that was the first coyote I have witnessed on the farm.

Not to invoke any judgment over the situation of having a coyote on the farm, I will end this entry so as to lead to the next. Amongst the pictures of “coyotes in Maryland”, there were a disturbing number that were of dead coyotes, sometimes in piles, and sometimes in piles with a human male crouched beside with a gun in hand. My thoughts once viewing those pictures immediately were on how it has come to be that coyotes, that are absolutely indigenous to our region, have not been present for most of my mere forty years of existence. It also reflects how wolves that once reigned the terrain are non-existent… and why groundhogs are EVERYWHERE!

But I am done with this entry. I was able to witness a vibrant creature new to me, but not ultimately new to the environment of central Maryland. My next entry will deal with that human idiocy of eradication… of all creatures deemed negative to the human species. This is a modern absurdity, that is, to the denizens of North America. And much like the problem with modernity… it is based on simplicity. The fact of the matter is… it’s complicated!