Fox or Coyote?

Spring is really here now. The snow is gone. Thunderstorms are predicted all this week. The snowdrops have finished blooming.

The crocus are nearing their end. 

The Carolina Anemones are dotting the front lawn.

The forsythia are starting to bloom,

and so are the daffodils.

In the animal world there is more activity. The spring peepers continue to sing their tinkling love songs. And some birds are already busy finding nesting sites. For example, there's a barn swallow's nest on the stone siding under and eave that I failed to knock down last year. It has been visited by a pair of birds all week. 

Other animals have been more visible too. Just yesterday morning, during breakfast, I spotted a coyote out hunting for rodents in the upper hay field.

I called my family's attention to it, but there was some dispute as to whether it really WAS a coyote. My husband thought it was only a fox, since he didn't think the legs were long enough. In the middle of a rolling hay field it is hard to gauge size when there is nothing nearby for reference and the hay is at various heights in various places in the field.

I KNEW it wasn't a red fox. I had just watched a red fox doing the same thing the coyote was doing only a few days before, albeit at dinner time. 

This animal was colored entirely differently. It was suggested to me that it could be a gray fox. I was pretty sure that it wasn't. The ears weren't big enough, the nose wasn't narrow enough, and the tail wasn't bushy enough or long enough for it to be a fox. In fact, the whole animal seemed larger to me. So I snapped some photos for reference and decided to double-check later.

That afternoon I looked up pictures of gray foxes... not even close. I pulled up the pics. of the red fox I had snapped just to double check. Nope.

Sure enough, it was a coyote. 

It wasn't as big as the one we had spotted several times before, 

so perhaps it was a juvenile or a female. 

I was worried when we were contemplating moving here that what with all my duties as wife, mother, teacher, home-maker, etc., I would never get to enjoy the outdoors and it would be a "waste" to purchase a home like this, especially considering how much my husband works and travels too. I figured I'd be mowing when I did manage to get out, which would keep the beasts at bay. Or I would be tending squealing children or working on the land, not sitting around enjoying it. And I knew that there would at least be periods when I wouldn't get out much- like now, when I have an 8 week old and the weather is still cool. But in the end, I have found that the wildlife comes to my door, sometimes literally, and I enjoy it more than I ever imagined would be possible. 

Just this morning, leaving in the dark, a raccoon sat 2 feet from the drive as I passed it. It stared at the vehicle placidly- or should I say defiantly- eyes all aglow in the headlights. Upon returning home in the twilight of the morning, a bare-tailed possum scurried across the drive right in front of me. It's undulating rump vanishing in the bushes as I passed. And later, as I sat nursing my young son as he snuffled and snorked due to his cold, I saw geese splash down onto the pond.

It is neat to be so surrounded by nature. It keeps things in perspective. I live on the critter's turf really. All the pollution we humans create, all of the noise, all of the bulldozing and paving and restricting... it hasn't stopped all of the creatures. I live 5 minutes from town. I can hear the highway, train, and quarry equipment when the wind is right. But there are still wild things about due to the woods all around us. It's both comforting and intimidating.

But one thing is for certain. I need to figure out how to build a chicken fortress instead of a coop, and have to let go of the idea of chickens scratching in the lawn, perching on the porch, or taking dust baths in the flower beds, as they did at our old home. This coyote was spotted at 8:30 in the morning in full daylight. The fox was last seen at 5:30 in broad daylight. (The time before that, the fox used our sidewalk! Heck, a coyote once stood at the end of the walk to our front door too!) And of course along with the raccoons and possums, there are always the owls, hawks and snakes too!

 (Those links are to previous posts. If you're interested in posts about my earlier coyote spottings, here they are: Coyote Chase, Lone Coyote, Look at the Deer, Dear! )