Sneaky the Fox

    Sneaky woke up. Stretching with a big yawn, he left his burrow. Fresh snow showered down on him from the bushes and he shook it off with a little, impatient flick of his beautiful, big and bushy tail. He stopped and sat down to lick away the last couple flakes of snow from his shoulder. Being proud of his glossy, thick red coat, he couldn’t stand to be seen with any of it out of place. The Ravens had been giving him a hard time with their haughty laughter, high up in the fir trees.

    He emerged from the shelter of the forest to glance up and down the trail. A few nights ago he had seen a team of big dogs traveling towards the People’s dwelling, and had a made a quick dash to the safety of the woods, out of sight, where he stood panting while he watched their progress.

    But Sneaky hadn’t lived so long in the barren north without learning how to find an easy meal. It was late winter and things were scarce. The Ptarmigan who’d survived were flighty and the Snowshoe rabbits especially fleet. An opportunist who never missed an opportunity, Sneaky followed the dog team. By the light of the midnight moon, he sniffed around the cabin and dog yard. He laughed at the big dog’s heavy slumber, envisioning himself trotting through the middle of the dog yard without them being any wiser. But of course, he knew, it would be too risky to actually do it. It’s something only the big Moose would be foolish enough to attempt.

    The best part of his investigation was the discovery of a pile of dog food snacks, cut up and bagged in nice, mouthful-size pieces, just waiting to be eaten…by me, he thought. There were a few in easy to reach places, underneath the edge of the tarp with hardly any snow on top, but it had taken some effort to get to the heart of the mountainous pile.

    Sneaky trotted up the trail, sniffing the wind for any alarm. Nothing, everything was still. He smiled, anticipating the meal he was about to receive.

    He crept up to the pile and dug the fresh snow away from the tunnel he’d made into the snack pile. There was plenty of variety here: the red salmon, tasty beef and slimy chicken. But something smelled especially good. He turned to follow the scent and licked his chops.

    There it was, just to the edge of his little trail – a piece of green tripe, just a step away. Sneaky stepped forward.

    “Yyyip! Yip!” Sneaky cried as a squirrel trap closed over his foot. He shook it off and set off running, limping on his pinched paw.

    A mile away he stopped and looked back, before setting off again. The stockpile of food was no longer an option – he wouldn’t go back. His foot hurt and he stopped to sit down and lick away the soreness. He was sorry to lose the meals, But I’m Sneaky, he thought, I’ll find another source of food.

The fox is the little speck between the trees.

   

    Ok, so we really have had a fox start coming around to inspect the stash of dog food and steal bags of cut up trail snacks. He is a goregeous thing, dark red with a bushy tail, but now that he's getting into trouble eating the dog food we've had to scare him off. Hopefully he's the only one, but by now he probably told all his friends...

Here's a better picture of a fox - the one I saw was darker, though.