ARTIFICIAL FOX EARTHS. 157 



With regard to Aspect, i.e. the aspect of the entrances or 

 mouths, it is first of all necessary to look at the habits of the young 

 cub. It will be found that he does not come out of the bowels of 

 the earth till he is about four or five weeks old, generally at first 

 only for an hour or two morning and evening, after sunrise and 

 before sunset ; and as it is a well-known fact that the sun has a 

 great power in making young animals healthy, it is evident that 

 the mouths of the earth should be situated where they will catch 

 the most sun ; but at the same time it must be in such a place 

 that it is sheltered from the prevailing winds, and especially 

 from the north. It will be also noticed of young cubs that 

 for some weeks after coming out of the earth they keep close to 

 the mouth of the hole, gambolling and playing in a circle of a 

 few yards. Care should be taken, therefore, that the ground 

 round the mouth of the earth is of as dry a nature as possible, 

 as the little animals often play till they get hot and lie down, 

 and if the ground is at all swampy or wet they are very liable to 

 get what is commonly called ' yellows,' a canine form of jaundice ; 

 therefore let the aspect be as sunny as possible, sheltered from 

 the winds with dry ground round the mouth of the hole. 



With regard to the Position of the earth there are also 

 many points to be considered. Some people place their arti- 

 ficial earths in a gorse, but this I hold to be a mistake : as if the 

 earth is put as it should be, away from a ride or path, the earth- 

 stopper when the gorse is grown up will have great difficulty in 

 finding the earth in the dead of night unless he has a mark to 

 guide him. The result of this will be that he will always go 

 the same way, and eventually make a conspicuous path right up 

 to the earth. Besides this, a gorse covert is a covert where 

 foxes are expected to lie above ground, and the keeper going 

 to stop the earth at night disturbs the covert for the next day's 

 draw. Moreover, in regard to the question of breeding, very 

 Httle sun would reach the mouth of the earth. To some extent 

 these objections apply to the making of earths in large coverts. 

 The best artificial earth is probably one that is built in a small 

 spinney close by a large stronghold with a dell in it, the earth 



