Snow Foxs

Patrolling vast expanses, this wanderer of the far north has adapted to cycles of feast or famine Let a raven drop a bone onto the ice or the aromas from a hunter's cook tent waft from a mile away, and a small white shadow will soon materialize to investigate—an arctic fox. Near Hudson Bay a fox's curious nose pokes around a knifelike ridge of ice. "It is the friendliest and most trusting of the North American foxes, although it is characterized . . . as 'impudent,'" wrote naturalist Barry Lopez.

In winter these small, almost delicate foxes range over huge areas seeking rodents or mammal carcasses. Some cross more than 600 miles (966 kilometers) of pack ice in 40-below-zero conditions. The species expanded in the Arctic at the end of the last warm inter- glacial period, about 120,000 years ago. Evolution equipped them with small ears, short muzzles, and thick fur to minimize heat loss. Their feet are fur-covered, like hares'—hence their scientific name,Alopex lagopus, or "hare-footed fox."

Play or predation? Hunting ringed seal pups born in small caves under the snow in Norway's Svalbard archipelago, a fox rears up, jumps on a den, and dives in head first. Pups often escape from the den into open water. The foxes' keen noses can detect such lairs more than a mile away. Near Hudson Bay, foxes tag along with polar bears in winter to scavenge leftover seal carcasses.

Arctic foxes' most vital food source—or lack thereof—is a little fur ball called the lemming. Problem is, the rodents aren't reliable. "They don't commit mass suicide: That's a myth popularized by an old Walt Disney film," says James D. Roth, an ecologist at the University of Central Florida who has studied Hudson Bay foxes. "But lemmings do follow a natural boom-and-bust cycle. About every four years they're super-abundant, then they crash for one year, and gradually increase until the next peak." With a circumpolar range, arctic foxes probably total several hundred thousand with wide fluctuations because of variations in the lemming populations.

Most arctic foxes turn white in winter, but some have brownish blue fur. Many blue foxes live in coastal areas, where they blend into dark backgrounds. Both color types live in Svalbard, where competition for mates rouses rivals in March.

Some parts of the arctic foxes' range, like Svalbard, have no lemmings, so foxes there feed on seabirds, geese, and their eggs in summer. In winter the opportunist foxes scavenge seal and reindeer carcasses. Compared with Hudson Bay, Svalbard's fox population is more stable. "But because they rely on marine species, they have high concentrations of contaminants like PCBs," says Eva Fuglei, a wildlife biologist at the Norwegian Polar Institute, who is studying the effect of the toxics on the foxes' disease resistance and reproduction

As wildflowers replace ice and snow, young foxes emerge from dens in July. Lemming numbers have a huge impact on litter size. In 2002, when lemmings crashed in much of Canada, photographer Rosing found two sleepy pups in a den of only seven on Victoria Island in the Canadian Arctic. The following year, when lemmings were plentiful, "this den near Churchill had 13 pups", says Rosing, "and it was littered with lemming and bird carcasses." One of the den's adults for ages to feed its young. These foxes have shed their white winter coats for the brown and cream fur of summer. Blue foxes also turn dark brown this time of year.

In good lemming years one female may have up to 20 pups, and local arctic fox populations boom. When lemming numbers plummet, many arctic foxes starve in winter, leading to fewer and smaller litters.

Fox in the goose house: With more than a dozen hungry pups waiting, a female heads home with a mouthful of month-old snow goose. Critical to foxes during lean lemming years, about 100,000 snow geese nest on La Pérouse Bay near Churchill. "I found 72 geese feet in one Churchill den," says ecologist James Roth

When the pups were about two weeks old, their mother moved them one by one to a new den. Heavy rain may have prompted her decision, or she may have sought a cleaner site. Dens are often used by many generations—for as long as 300 years. The burrow complex may spread over 500 square feet (47 square meters) and have a hundred entrances, offering the pups quick escape from predators. Owls and eagles prey on young and adults, as do red foxes, a species from the south that overlaps the arctic foxes' range. Red foxes, which are considerably larger, also compete with arctic foxes for denning sites.

In years when food is abundant, adults feed their young through the summer until autumn, when the pups disperse. In lean years the pups leave the den earlier, to hunt on their own in a land where success is never a sure thing.

Wolves

Wolves is my favourite animal from now on as i had learn the ways of the wolves impressed.They hunt animals and kill their own habitats if they are When al go and hunt animals while the female stays in their territory and take cares of the cub.Most wolves will live in a cave as it is secure and save.Wolves are legendary because of their spine-tingling howl, which they use to communicate. A lone wolf howls to attract the attention of his pack, while communal howls may send territorial messages from one pack to another. Some howls are confrontational. Much like barking domestic dogs, wolves may simply begin howling because a nearby wolf has already begun.

Wolves are the largest members of the dog family. Adaptable gray wolves are by far the most common and were once found all over the Northern Hemisphere. But wolves and humans have a long adversarial history. Though they almost never attack humans, wolves are considered one of the animal world's most fearsome natural villains. They do attack domestic animals, and countless wolves have been shot, trapped, and poisoned because of this tendency.

In the lower 48 states, gray wolves were hunted to near extinction, though some populations survived and others have since been reintroduced. Few gray wolves survive in Europe, though many live in Alaska, Canada, and Asia.

Red wolves live in the southeastern United States, where they are endangered. These animals actually became extinct in the wild in 1980. Scientists established a breeding program with a small number of captive red wolves and have reintroduced the animal to North Carolina. Today, perhaps 100 red wolves survive in the wild.

The maned wolf, a distant relative of the more familiar gray and red wolves, lives in South America. Physically, this animal resembles a large, red fox more than its wolf relatives.

Wolves live and hunt in packs of around six to ten animals. They are known to roam large distances, perhaps 12 miles (20 kilometers) in a single day. These social animals cooperate on their preferred prey—large animals such as deer, elk, and moose. When they are successful, wolves do not eat in moderation. A single animal can consume 20 pounds (9 kilograms) of meat at a sitting. Wolves also eat smaller mammals, birds, fish, lizards, snakes, and fruit.

Wolfpacks are established according to a strict hierarchy, with a dominant male at the top and his mate not far behind. Usually this male and female are the only animals of the pack to breed. All of a pack's adults help to care for young pups by bringing them food and watching them while others hunt.