Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Predators and Varmints Rare Predator Called In

I have been calling coyotes and bobcats for a number of years, but this is my first grey fox called in. They are rare here, first one I've seen in over 30 years. I know they're mostly nocturnal, but I never see one run over, whereas I see coyotes, red foxes, and bobcats on the highway that have been hit. I would have considered mounting it, but the 22-250 messed a leg up pretty bad.

Beautiful animal...

Go for a tanned hide. Not much investment and will hide the leg blow up.

You know, I used to see grey fox in S.E. Wisconsin a lot more than I do now. I have not seen one in at least 15 yrs and have not gotten one on the trail cam in 8 or 9 yrs. I had two of them up in northwest Wisconsin and watched them come by the cabin and eat corn in the spring time. I kind of wish there were more.

Lots of them in my neck of the woods. I love to call them, the little woods fox is aggressive and not particularly spooky when the show up. Love to watch them plume that tail up, almost cat like. In fact, they can climb trees and I think that helps them escape the coyotes.

It seems that when the coyotes started moving into KY the gray fox moved out. In the 70's and 80's we used to see some. When the coyotes started moving in late 80's or early 90's I stopped seeing the fox's.

Been gone from KY about 20 years now, so I don't know what is happening there.

James How close did the tornado get to you?

Thanks
Dave

When I was a young hunter, we had lots of grey foxes, but very few Reds. As a matter of fact, a red was a trophy to be proud of. Now it is reversed, at least in my part of the state. I see lots of Red’s but I can’t remember the last Grey I saw.

Nice work, cool little critters.

I killed that fox in a very large hollow that stretches for several miles. I've also killed a bobcat and a coyote out of it this year, so that grey was living there with the other critters. Still, it is extremely rare to see them around here anymore.

Dave, we had tornadoes all around us. The closest was about 5 miles away. The one that killed a woman was about 15-20 miles from me. Too close for comfort.

Both reds and greys are still pretty common here in NE PA, although overall numbers of each seem to have decreased as coyote numbers have increased. The reds generally prefer farmlands and the greys brushy, wooded areas....

Greys are fairly common in the parts of NC and SC where I hunt. Funny thing happened two years ago. The beagles ran a rabbit into a gulley covered over with honeysuckle.They went in at the bottom chasing a rabbit and came out the top chasing a fox!

Nice fox... Haven't shot a grey in 40 years!!!

Here in North Texas we rarely ever see a Red Fox. Gray foxes are really common though.

That's my experience in Upstate NY also.

Mine also

Beautiful critters. There used to be lots of them in Southern California when I lived there in the 60's, no idea about now.

Rug3 and Robster, where do y'all cover? I used to hunt Schoharie, Montgomery, Fulton and Hamilton counties. Had a few grays (called them cat foxes) but mostly reds and coyotes.

Had a fisher come in one day and a mink or three. The fisher was pretty cool, sat and watched it for quite a while.

Took a beautiful red a couple weeks ago with a snubby 38 (all i had on me at the time) that was sitting in the edge eyeballing my chickens. She had already taken 4-5 over the previous couple of weeks. Got another one now that is killing my layers, haven't seen it yet to get a shot.

Ditto, around here the foxes have mostly moved out of the open country into the suburbs in order to escape the coyotes. When we lived on the golf course, we had a fox that regularly lounged on an big cottonwood stump in our backyard.

Common here but I fear the coyotes may drive them out.

Red fox were pretty common when I moved in 20 some years ago but they are kind of rare now as coyotes became more prevalent. I did not see any grey fox back then but I see them several times a year now. Greys are better able to avoid coyotes as the greys can climb trees. I had pictures on my flip phone of a grey that my dogs chased up a tree. I've seen others in trees since.

We're actually seeing more red foxes here now than we were several years ago, and fewer coyotes. The local Mennonites here have some strange ways, among them are that they are obsessed with deer antlers and coyote hides. Their barns are decorated with the antlers of the deer they kill......and size does not matter, and the trap coyotes in order to tan the hides, and hang them up for decorative purposes. Before so many of the Mennonites moved in around here, I'd call up and kill an average of 15-20 coyotes a year, which here in this part of the world was not bad, considering that the population was never real high.

I killed 5 this past fall and winter, and hunted as hard as ever. One Mennonite nearby trapped over a dozen, using the fish hook method, so that's part of what contributed to my low numbers. Anyway, I think the reduction in the coyote population has allowed the foxes to make a sort of comeback. Reds have always been around this part of the country, greys in certain areas. I think grey foxes prefer the heavily wooded areas, which was where I killed the one I called up this year. I have to go several miles from home to find that.