Abstract
IN NATURE of September 10 (p. 452), there is a paragraph in praise of the intelligence of the (English) fox, with examples in proof. Permit me to say that his California cousin is next door to a fool. My young son has amused himself for the past three summers in trapping (in large box-traps) the small California foxes which infest these mountains, and which live on a mixed diet of Manzanita berries and astronomer's chickens. I pass over the fact that each trap has painted over its door “Danger to all who enter here!”, and I proceed to show that our California foxes are barely one remove from idiots. When they are caught, my boy is in the habit of fastening a small leather collar about their necks, and of chaining them with light chains to stakes near the Observatory buildings. Many of them have escaped by parting the chains (by dint of strength, not of intelligence), and have been again caught within two or three days in the same traps! One of them was caught three times in quick succession! I presume an English fox, once caught, would emigrate to North Britain, or at least to the next county. My own ideas of the intelligence of the fox, until I came here, were derived from Goldsmith's “Animated Nature,” and, generally, from English writings.
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HOLDEN, E. California Foxes. Nature 45, 8 (1891). https://doi.org/10.1038/045008b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/045008b0
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