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Apparently foxes just want to have fun, as evidenced by this photo snapped by Brit Duncan Usher outside Bursfelde, Germany.
“One ran back to the top of the conveyor belt and then started to walk back down it, stopped and sat down,” Usher said in an interview. “After a few seconds it started to slide down the conveyor belt using its front paws to drag it forwards [...] I have not seen this type of behavior amongst free living wild animals and I was really surprised and pleased to witness and capture this unusual event.”
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Researchers analysing remains at a prehistoric burial ground in Jordan have uncovered a grave in which a fox was buried with a human, before part of it was then transferred to an adjacent grave.
The University of Cambridge-led team believes that the unprecedented case points to some sort of emotional attachment between human and fox. Their paper, published today, suggests that the fox may have been kept as a pet and was being buried to accompany its master, or mistress, to the afterlife.
If so, it marks the first known burial of its kind and suggests that long before we began to hunt foxes using dogs, our ancestors were keeping them as pets - and doing so earlier than their canine relatives.
The cemetery, at Uyun-al-Hammam, in northern Jordan, is about 16,500 years old, which makes the grave 4,000 years older than the earliest known human-dog burial and 7,000 years earlier than anything similar here involving a fox.
Writing in the open-access journal, PLoS One, the researchers also suggest that this early example of human-animal burial may be part of a bigger picture of growing cultural sophistication that has typically been associated with the farming societies of the Neolithic era, thousands of years later.
Sadly for fox-lovers, however, the relationship between man and that particular beast was probably short-lived. The paper also says it is unlikely that foxes were ever domesticated in full and that, despite their early head start, their recruitment as a friendly household pet fell by the wayside in later millennia as their human masters took to the more companionable dog instead. ...
The University of Cambridge-led team believes that the unprecedented case points to some sort of emotional attachment between human and fox. Their paper, published today, suggests that the fox may have been kept as a pet and was being buried to accompany its master, or mistress, to the afterlife.
If so, it marks the first known burial of its kind and suggests that long before we began to hunt foxes using dogs, our ancestors were keeping them as pets - and doing so earlier than their canine relatives.
The cemetery, at Uyun-al-Hammam, in northern Jordan, is about 16,500 years old, which makes the grave 4,000 years older than the earliest known human-dog burial and 7,000 years earlier than anything similar here involving a fox.
Writing in the open-access journal, PLoS One, the researchers also suggest that this early example of human-animal burial may be part of a bigger picture of growing cultural sophistication that has typically been associated with the farming societies of the Neolithic era, thousands of years later.
Sadly for fox-lovers, however, the relationship between man and that particular beast was probably short-lived. The paper also says it is unlikely that foxes were ever domesticated in full and that, despite their early head start, their recruitment as a friendly household pet fell by the wayside in later millennia as their human masters took to the more companionable dog instead. ...
Ta ever so much, dear MSiegel
Ta much, dear Edosan
Foxhunting is a good idea.
Cat - fox hunter
This cat’s owner is a fanatic wildlife photographer. Once he decided to stay for winter for five month in unique protected areas of Kamchatka and had no way to leave his pet at home. So the only option was to take two boxes with him - one for the cat, by the way named Ryska, and the other for cat-food reserve for half a year.
Living in a tiny barn standing in the middle of nowhere this guy began each morning with coffee and fried eggs with bacon. The smell of fresh fried bacon appeared to be a kind of a drug for local foxes. Dozens of their generations have never known that people are hunting them for fur so they fearlessly joined the photographer each morning to have a portion of delicious smell. Some of the foxes even competed for the right to come closer to the window in order not only to smell but to see bacon.
Ryska was spoilt with expensive cat-food and hunted local mice just for fun of it. In short, she was extremely unaggressive. But watching a pack of foxes impudently smelling master’s fried bacon was intolerable. Anywhere 50 meters far from the barn foxes were severely oppressed. Once Ryska even drove a frightened fox onto a tree! What is more she even used the same manner to bears. They were not so fearful but still preferred not to come close.
Fox takes tube station escalator
An urban fox stunned London Underground passengers by calmly taking an escalator to navigate a tube station.
By Murray Wardrop
Published: 7:30AM GMT 08 Dec 2009
An urban Fox in London: The fox was spotted in Walthamstow Station Photo: BARCROFT MEDIA
The animal was spotted by Kate Arkless Gray, 29, on Saturday night as she made her way home from a friend's wedding.
She watched in amazement as the fox boarded the escalator at Walthamstow Central just after midnight to leave the station.
Miss Arkless Gray said: "As I got off the train and headed towards the up escalator I saw this daring creature dashing full speed down the down escalator, which was taped off for maintenance workers at the bottom.
"I was wishing I'd been able to film it and then the workers at the bottom of the escalator shooed him back up again."
She then managed to capture the surreal scene as the fox casually made his ascent on the escalator back towards the exit. ...
An urban fox stunned London Underground passengers by calmly taking an escalator to navigate a tube station.
By Murray Wardrop
Published: 7:30AM GMT 08 Dec 2009
An urban Fox in London: The fox was spotted in Walthamstow Station Photo: BARCROFT MEDIA
The animal was spotted by Kate Arkless Gray, 29, on Saturday night as she made her way home from a friend's wedding.
She watched in amazement as the fox boarded the escalator at Walthamstow Central just after midnight to leave the station.
Miss Arkless Gray said: "As I got off the train and headed towards the up escalator I saw this daring creature dashing full speed down the down escalator, which was taped off for maintenance workers at the bottom.
"I was wishing I'd been able to film it and then the workers at the bottom of the escalator shooed him back up again."
She then managed to capture the surreal scene as the fox casually made his ascent on the escalator back towards the exit. ...
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Rppell's Fox