How Does the Grey Fox Get Its Food?

The grey fox lives throughout both the North and South American continents, ranging from southern Canada to northern Columbia and Venezuela, excepting certain North American mountainous areas and the Great Plains. The grey fox is an omnivore, meaning that it feeds on members of both the animal and plant kingdoms. The grey fox stores its food for the winter like most foxes, but it is one of only two canids that climb trees.

  1. Omnivorous Diet

    • As an omnivorous animal, the grey fox consumes both plants and animals. Its exact diet changes with the season. In winter and spring, the grey fox consumes more small mammals than it does insects, birds and plant matter. However, in late summer and fall, the grey fox consumes more plant matter and insects than it does small mammals and birds. Of the mammals the grey fox eats, rodents and rabbits are most prevalent; grasshoppers dominate the insects in the grey fox's diet, and acorns and persimmons dominate the plant matter that the grey fox consumes.

    Hunting Habits

    • The grey fox hunts by itself, without the aid of a pack. It will actively hunt in the brush of its habitat, where its prey keep their own dens and feeding grounds. Grey foxes are one of two members of the canid family that climb trees, and it sometimes climbs trees to hunt birds nesting in them. In the late summer and fall, the grey fox shifts its focus to foraging for edible plant matter. The grey fox is more active at night, but is not a solely nocturnal hunter.

    Times of Scarcity

    • When its prey is less abundant, the grey fox resorts to digging up previously stored food. The grey fox kills more than it can eat at a times to ensure that it has food during harder times. Like most foxes, the grey fox uses its urine to mark the spot where food is stored to prevent forgetting the stored food's location.

    Captive Prey

    • The grey fox does not hunt solely in the wilds of its habitat. If it lives near enough to human dwellings where small animals are kept, the grey fox will often break into enclosures and eat the captive prey. Chickens are a usual victim of this practice, and the grey fox can kill entire coops at a time, eating some and storing the rest. This practice is more dangerous for the fox than hunting in the wild, as farmers often hunt foxes as a direct result of this behavior.