36 Game and Foxes. 



Should a rearer not be in a position to provide 

 a wire-netting fence for his field, he must make 

 use of such means of protection against foxes as 

 are at his disposal, and every dog he possesses 

 should be put on guard. Now, it is impossible to 

 have dogs loose about the rearing-field, even at 

 night, when the broods may be closed in their 

 coops, for there are no means of insuring that 

 they shall not wander off in the darkness on 

 business of their own. Every keeper who takes 

 the trouble to examine the ground in the vicinity 

 of his kennels when snow covers it knows that 

 chained dogs are no terror to foxes, for tracks of 

 the latter may often be seen but a few feet distant 

 from the farthest limit the chain permits a dog to 

 reach. There is only one way of overcoming this 

 difficulty, and it is to peg down a stout wire a few 

 score yards in length. To this the dog must be 

 fastened with a short piece of chain, at the end of 

 which is a ring to run up and down the wire. 

 Place the dog's kennel at one end of the wire and 

 his drinking pan at the other, and this will cause 

 him to patrol his beat more regularly. The value 

 of this system rests in the fact that if a fox 

 appears the dog is able to dash after him to the 

 full limit allowed by the wire, and that is quite 

 enough to make Reynard believe the dog free to 



