When I was a kid, my dad & I were hunting rabbits with beagles. Toby the beagle picked up scent and started running and calling out. Turns out he was running after a grey fox. We watched that fox run in the same route 5 or 6 times followed by the dog. The fox would stay just out of sight of the dog, really just kind of cruising along. After all of those circuits, the fox went straight instead of curving around like he had and made his getaway. Toby stayed on the hot trail and never noticed that the fox had split. I was very cool to watch. At one point in the circuit, the fox ran 6 feet away from where we were standing and as long as we stood still, the fox ignored us as he was working to lose the dog.

It seems Lubbock has always had a resident population. I remember seeing them back in the 70's.

Funny story, I was cycling on a sidewalk on a busy street, and I see a fox sprinting across the cemetery on the other side, running right at me. When I first saw her she was easily 50 yds from the road. She had a kit in her mouth and was at nearly a dead-sprint. Right as she got to the street, the traffic magically parted and she made all seven lanes without any problem at 6pm in the evening. Smart gal had sat back and timed it all so that when she got there it would be clear.

Had a backyard fox as well who liked to get into the hen house and grab eggs. There is a pair of red fox at our lease that I see occasionally early in the morning.

I know the canyon you're talking about. Very pretty area.

They're cool little critters. We've had the grays behind the house for 15 or so years now. They have a den in a pile of rocks near our fence. We've never had a snake problem or mouse/rat problem. I dont know if they kill snakes or not but Ive seen them got nuts over rodents and lizards. They seem to love fruit too. They go for the texas persimmon fruit. We get a kick out of watching them.
We have recently started getting coyote's and pigs here, so it will be interesting to see if the foxes hold their own.

I regularly watched this one hunting from my blind several nights in a row a couple of years ago. It was great fun to watch and at one point, it started getting closer and closer to my blind - and then it crawled up the ladder and sniffed at the door. It caught my scent, scampered back down to the ground, and then stared up to see what was hiding behind that door. Here is a photo as it started up the ladder.

Way cool. I have a cousin that has one she feeds and it hangs out with the dogs and cats. She can even pet it

When I was a kid in Hamilton about 1972 our neighbor had a pet red fox....they found it as a very young pup and hand raised it....made an awesome pet.....

In the 30’s and 40’s there where no red fox in the post oak Savannah. They were either hunted to extinction or died of disease. In the late 40’s into the 50’s, My father and a group of wealthy men with property from Hood, Johnson, Parker, Palo Pinto and Tarrant counties would buy breeding pairs of Red Fox from my cousins in the Ozark's of Missouri. They stocked them along the Brazos and Trinity river Bottoms. More than 20 pairs of Red Fox were purchased and brought to Texas to build a huntable population. My cousins would capture them late in the year and when released the Men would let them establish a den before using them to run their dog’s the next year. It cost these men $100 a pair. Not sure what that would be in today’s money? So if you see a Red anywhere in the Savanah, most likely it is a descendant of the Red’s from Missouri.

cool story ... I remember reading about a group trying to establish the red fox back into an area west and northwest of Waco back in the mid 1900s.

Great photos and a critter I really enjoy. I live on a ranch in DeWitt County and I see them all the time. I have a pet that comes and goes. It took a couple of years to get used to me, but she will come when I squeak now. My hound dog ignores her, but she is more comfortable when he has gone to bed. Almost every night in the cool or cold nights, she and I sit on the porch and enjoy the evening. She brings her kits around every year, but none have stuck with me.



I do a lot of hog hunting at night and when I walk out back, she always goes out with me. She actually will blood trail a hog for me. This picture is very fuzzy, it looks light but it was very dark at this point.



She passed me to head of the trail, but I "chirped" at her to hold up as I could hear the large boar trashing that I had just shot and he was not dead. She spun back around and disappeared into the dark. There was a loud growl and she immediately reappeared and flew past me heading back out. I just kept my rifle pointed up the trail and waited a few minutes before backing out. She is very dependable. If I have a gun and walk to the back in the dark, I will turn around and she is trotting along behind me.

I'm always careful around the critters, anything, as things can happen. Three years ago my nearest neighbor had a fox come in the house. The grandkids were on the couch watching TV, it jumped up and bit one. This happened in a minute. The house was closed up, the kid was taken to the hospital. He went back to the house and found the fox, it was dead. He called the State lab in Austin and immediately left on the two-hour drive. It was rabid.