Indian Fox

About this species

Size

Head and body about 47–50cm; tail about 29cm

Diet

Omnivorous: insects, small mammals, reptiles, small birds and fruit

Habitat

Semi-arid short grassland, open scrub and dry plains; avoids dense forest, tall grass and true desert

Range

Indian subcontinent, from the Himalayan foothills to southern India

The Indian fox, or Bengal fox, is a small, slender fox with a long, pointed muzzle, large pointed ears and a long, bushy tail with a distinctive black tip. Its grizzled coat varies from buff to silver-grey, usually reddish grey above with paler sides, rusty legs and pale sandy underparts. The backs of the ears are dark brown edged with black, and there is often a dark smudge on the muzzle in front of the eyes. (Wikipedia, general species account).

Across its range the Indian fox is active mainly at dusk and at night, spending hot days under bushes or in dens that range from simple two-entrance burrows to complex systems with many openings. The basic social unit is a breeding pair. It is an opportunist, eating insects, rodents, reptiles, small birds and fruit. It is not particularly wary of people and often lives close to villages and farmland. It prefers flat or gently rolling short grassland and scrub, the habitat that is disappearing fastest (Wikipedia, general species account).

India's semi-arid short grasslands are the species' stronghold, and they are rapidly being lost to farming. In the Great Indian Bustard Sanctuary near Nannaj in Maharashtra, researchers found 26 breeding dens, 19 of them in grassland, and showed that foxes chose den sites close to native grassland, often digging into earthen bunds or boulder piles (Punjabi et al. 2013). The authors call these grasslands neglected ecosystems whose remaining patches are critical for the fox.

Description: Wildlife of India guide, Wildlife of Everywhere (wildlifeofeverywhere.com); general species information paraphrased from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)