The Fox and the Hound by Daniel P. Mannix

Author:Daniel P. Mannix [Mannix, Daniel P.]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Tags: YA, Animals, Classic, Fiction
Publisher: Dutton
Published: 1967-01-01T06:00:00+00:00

6

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Fourth Hunt - Trapping

There was almost no autumn that year. Winter struck early and hard. The frozen ground hurt the foxes' pads and they had few caches to fall back upon. The scent world had changed. At night, the intense cold "froze" scent so it could not evaporate, and the foxes were forced to hunt after daylight when the sun's warmth thawed the oily scent particles sufficiently to allow them to rise.

The habits of the game also changed. Rabbits were no longer found in open fields but crouching in brushpiles or sometimes in drainpipes. Quail, grouse, and pheasants went to roost deep in honeysuckle tangles, as they would have frozen to death in trees. The foxes might not have survived the winter had it not been for their teamwork. They nearly always hunted in couples now, the vixen either following Tod and often stepping in his footprints, or else running parallel to him some fifteen yards to one side. When they came to a brushpile, they would separate and approach it from both sides so that if a rabbit darted out, one or the other would be ready. If they passed a drain pipe running under a road, one fox would take up a position by one end of the pipe while the other ran through it to chase out any rabbits. On these expeditions, Tod would follow the ridges where he had a good view, while the vixen stopped in whatever cover was available. When Tod came to the highest point, he would sit down like a dog and study the surrounding country both with eyes and nose. If either brought him word of game, he would swing around and try to herd it toward the vixen waiting in ambush. So by keeping together they were able to exist, whereas either alone would have grown too weak to hunt.

The intense cold had given both foxes magnificent rich, deep pelts dyed burnt orange, lemon, ebony, and ivory. As the foxes were color-blind, they could not see their own glory, but the coats kept them warm except on the very worst days when even Tod had to take refuge in a burrow.

One morning while Tod was running along a high ridge, he saw the Man who had hunted him with Copper following his route along a fence line. The Man was alone and had a pack basket on his back, but Tod recognized him both by smell and by his manner of walking. Tod stopped at once to watch while the vixen, thinking he had found game, glided into a rhododendron thicket to wait. Curious as usual, Tod watched to see what the human would do. The vixen grew tired of waiting and ran up the ridge to find out what was going on, but when she saw the Man she turned away at once. The vixen had no curiosity about humans, only a deep dread. Tod, on the other hand, had been brought up by a human and lived near

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