522 Practical Game Preserving. 



A peculiarity is the persistence with which the habit 

 of burying its food sticks to the fox, and when we have 

 had foxes, caught wild and full grown, confined for a week 

 or so, having thrown them in a dead rabbit for food, if 

 we returned in five minutes, the coney was always buried 

 in a corner, and any tame fox showed the same characteristic. 

 What the object could be we do not know, and probably 

 the animals bury for no other reason than that their instinct 

 prompts them to do so. In a wild state they nine times 

 out of ten never return to obtain prey that they may 

 have buried, and we have over and over again seen traps 

 set, and set them ourselves, all round rabbits which have 

 been known thus concealed, and have never caught a fox, 

 or seen one captured under these particular circumstances. 



The different times of day, and night also, when the 

 fox sallies forth from its place of concealment, vary a good 

 deal according to weather, season, and locality as well as the 

 inclinations of the nimble little animals which may form its 

 favourite food. In the early months of the year, when the 

 rabbits keep pretty much below ground, and when birds 

 and food in general are scarce, the " varmint with a brush " 

 takes a round in all seriousness early in the morning, as 

 soon as the darkness of night commences to disappear, 

 and searches for food as long as may be expedient to 

 attain sufficient, or until its operations are likely to be 

 disturbed ; and although it may continue at intervals during 

 the day to make short hunts and move about a little in 

 pursuit, within the shelter of the covert, it will not again 

 leave the near neighbourhood of its lair until the short day 

 of the early year draws to a close, when it again sets forth 



