Fox Hunter

We had a change in weather last week and it got down to the 50s at night. I guess that makes animals do things they normally wouldn't. Saturday morning I took our dogs out for a walk and turned them loose in a 3 acre field next to the neighborhood lake and a busy walking trail. I like to let them run around in the field and tire themselves out so I don't have to do it.

When they got to the middle they found a surprise in the tall grass.  A Red Fox had dug out a small hole and was laying in it, waiting for his breakfast to come by. He didn't expect two 80 lb dogs and they sure didn't expect him.

Bowden & Hunter

After all three animals ran around for a while they stopped to stare at each other. None of them had done this dance before.

I was able to get the dogs back on their leash and the fox made his exit with only his reputation as a hunter diminished by the encounter. Our dogs were proud of themselves but still hungry too after their first fox hunt.

It reminded me of stories about my wife's grandfather. Ivy Wilson Lawrence was born in 1887 and died in 1965 in middle Tennessee. He was the son of Eli Lewis Lawrence and Lassie Hall. He farmed some and had a sawmill he would move from place to place, where ever someone needed trees made into lumber but his enduring reputation is as a fox hunter.



Ivy Wilson Lawrence

He didn't shoot the foxes and the dogs didn't catch them. In fact, apparently Ivy rarely even saw the fox. It was truly the hunt that gave the thrill for both Ivy and his dogs. His son told me he never went fox hunting with him so the only memories of the fox hunts are from two of the older grand kids.

They said when they went out, in the early 1960s he would setup a small camp, let the dogs out and sit there by the fire until the dogs came back in the morning. He would stay up all night listening to the dogs barking and apparently that was a commentary only he understood on where the dogs were located and how close or not the fox was. The grand kids would normally sleep through most of the hunt and the next morning the dogs were back and they would all head home.