Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon

Genus Vulpes

The foxes form a distinct group of the Canidæ; their bodies are long, with short legs, the muzzle more lengthened in comparison and much sharper, and the pupil of the eye contracts vertically instead of circularly; the tail is very bushy, with a gland at the base secreting a strong odorous substance. The female has six mammæ. There are two types in India—the desert fox or fox of the plains, Cynalopex of Hamilton Smith; and the hill fox, which approximates to the European species. The former has longer ears and longer and more slender limbs.

No. 250. Vulpes Bengalensis.
The Indian Fox (Jerdon’s No. 138).

Native Names.—Lomri, Lokri, Lokeria, Hindi; Kokri, Mahrathi; Khekar and Khikir in Behar; Khek-sial, Bengali; Konk, Kemp-nari, Chanaak-nari, Canarese; Konka-nakka or Gunta-nakka, Poti-nara, Telegu.—Jerdon.

Habitat.—Throughout India; probably Ceylon, as Kellaart mentions having heard of a fox there, but I cannot trace it, or any other, in Burmah.

Description.—“Reddish-grey; rufous on the legs and muzzle; reddish white beneath; ears long dark brown externally; tail long bushy, with a broad black tip; muzzle very acute; chin and throat whitish.”—Jerdon.

Here is Colonel Sykes’s description of it in Southern India:—

“It is a very pretty animal, but smaller than the European fox; head short; muzzle very sharp; eyes oblique; irides nut-brown; legs very slender; tail trailing on the ground, very bushy; along the back and on the forehead fawn colour, with hair having a white ring to its tip; back, neck, between the eyes, along the sides, and half way down the tail reddish-grey; each hair banded black and reddish-white; all the legs reddish outside, reddish-white inside; chin and throat dirty white; along the belly reddish-white; ears externally dark brown, and with the fur so short as to be scarcely discoverable; edges of eyelids black; muzzle red brown.”

The colour however varies a good deal, according to season and locality. It becomes more grey in the cold season. McMaster writes that he once killed one silvery grey, almost white.

Size.—Head and body, 20 to 21 inches; tail, 12 to 14 inches; weight, 5½ lbs.

This fox is common, not only in open country, but even in cantonments and suburbs of cities. Hardly a night passes without its familiar little chattering bark in the Dalhousie Square gardens, or on the Maidan, being heard; and few passengers running up and down our railway lines, who are on the look-out for birds and animals as the train whirls along, fail to see in the early morning our little grey friend sneaking home with his brush trailing behind him.

Jerdon says of the manner in which he carries this that he trails it when going slowly or hunting for food; holds it out horizontal when running; and raises it almost erect when making a sudden turn.

It also, like the jackal; will eat fruit, such as melons, ber, &c., and herbs. It breeds in the spring, from February to April, and has four cubs. Jerdon says the cubs are seldom to be seen outside their earth till nearly full grown. It is much coursed with greyhounds, and gives most amusing sport, doubling constantly till it gets near an earth; but it has little or no smell, so its scent does not lie.

Sir Walter Elliot wrote of it in the Madras Journal of Literature and Science (vol. x. p. 102): “Its principal food is rats, land-crabs, grasshoppers, beetles, &c. On one occasion a half-devoured mango was found in the stomach. It always burrows in open plains, runs with great speed, doubling like a hare; but instead of stretching out at first like that animal, and trusting to its turns as a last resource, the fox turns more at first; and, if it can fatigue the dogs, it then goes straight away.”

It is easily tamed if taken young, and is very playful, but Jerdon, in repeating the assertion that tame foxes sooner or later go mad, says he has known one or two instances where they have done so; but McMaster throws doubt on this, and puts the supposed madness down to excitement at the amorous season. He gives an interesting account of a pair kept by a friend, which lived on amicable terms with his greyhounds. The owner writes: “I sometimes took them on to the parade ground, and slipped a couple of greyhounds after them. They never ran far, as when tired they lay down on their backs, and were at once recognised by the dogs. On one occasion one fox was tired before the other, and after he had made friends with the dogs he joined them in the chase after the other.”

No. 251. VULPES LEUCOPUS.
The Desert Fox (Jerdon’s No. 139).

Habitat.—Northern India, and also on the Western Coast about Cutch.

Description.—“Light fulvous on the face, middle of back and upper part of tail; cheeks, sides of neck and body, inner side, and most of the fore parts of the limbs, white; shoulder and haunch, and outside of the limbs nearly to the middle joint, mixed black and white; tail darker at the base above, largely tipped with white; lower parts nigrescent; ears black posteriorly; fur soft and fine as in V. montanus, altogether dissimilar from that of V. Bengalensis. The skull with the muzzle distinctly narrower, and the lower jaw weaker. One I killed at Hissar had the upper parts fulvous, the hair black-tipped; sides paler; whole lower parts from the chin, including the inside of the arm and thigh, blackish; feet white on the inner side anteriorly, with a blackish border on the anterior limbs; legs fulvous externally; all feet white; tail always with a white tip.”—Jerdon.

Size.—Head and body, 20 inches; tail, 14 inches; weight, 5½ lbs.

According to Mountstuart Elphinstone the backs of the foxes in Hurriana are of the same colour as the common fox, but in one part of the desert their legs and belly, up to a certain height, are black, and in another white—the one seems to have been wading up to the belly in ink, and the other in whitewash.

This fox lives chiefly on the jerboa-rat (Gerbillus Indicus) common on sandy plains. Jerdon thinks it more speedy than the common Indian fox.