Vermont State Parks

I saw a red fox hunting mice in a snowy field in Allis State Park recently. I was out for a trail run in the snowy woods, and popped out into a meadow area. I caught the fox by surprise; it hid behind some winter weeds, and then made a mad dash for nearby woods. Later, at a tracking workshop, I learned that red foxes not only use their keen sense of hearing to hunt for mice underneath the surface of the snow, but they also use Earth’s magnetic field to increase the accuracy of their pounces on prey. When foxes pounce in the Northeastern direction, they are successful in catching a mouse 73% of the time. In other directions the success rate is 18%. It was very exciting to see that red fox, and even more interesting to learn more about them soon afterwards.  (Here are the details on that interesting research: http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/notrocketscience/2011/01/11/foxes-use-the-earths-magnetic-field-as-a-targeting-system/#.VrIns9IrLcs ) This was an adventure of le...