Foxes vs. Rabbits

     You may have noticed that a stickball bat was in my Suburban Survival Kit – for coyotes.  And you may have wondered how I was planning to defend our land against foxes.

     Actually I see foxes as a valuable part of the animal control team. They are an essential counterpoint to the rabbits and squirrels.  A couple of years ago we were almost lucky enough to get a hawk to move into the neighborhood.  But a murder of crows took care of that.  I watched those old crows hector the hawk even as the rabbit and squirrel population was exploding on the ground below them.  The hawk got the message and left for a more friendly place.

     Last winter the rabbits ate everything they could.  And it all happened in the dead of night, behind my back.  I would look out the window in the morning and see an evergreen striped or another tree girdled – they always went for the unexpected, and I was always one step behind.

      As I was doing remediation this summer, I assumed that there were plenty of greens available for all.  I dreamily awaited the Stargazer Lilies that I planted last year.  I had lost one to winter, but the other two resurrected in late spring on sturdy stalks with a spiral staircase of leaves.  Last week I walked out to pull a few of the many thousands of thistles on my font lawn and this is what I found:

Why?  Why?  Why?  The voracious rabbits were at it again.

      A neighbor told me that a whole fox family is currently laying up under a shed a couple of blocks away.  He agreed that foxes are our friends because those voracious rabbits have cost us all a fortune in trees, shrubs, heartache and stress.  Foxes are definitely part of my Suburban Survival Kit. 

      Now, lest you think that I have forgotten about Michele Bachmann, I want to reassure you that I have not.  The articles in the Strib and the NYTimes today were fascinating - and tomorrow I will send you a particularly juicy quotation from the Times.  But for tonight I am going to stay in my pastoral idle - in other words - my survival kit would not be complete without some denial.