Pennsylvania’s red fox carries an immigrant history. The state’s 3,479 records, led by Bucks, Montgomery, and Chester counties, descend in large part from European foxes brought over and released for foxhunting in the colonial era, stock that mingled with native foxes spreading down from the north and went on to colonize the whole state.
A generalist at the field’s edge
Red foxes do best where woods give way to open hunting ground, and southeastern Pennsylvania’s quilt of farms, hedgerows, and suburbs suits them perfectly. They take mice and voles in meadows, rabbits along fencerows, and fruit, insects, and carrion as the seasons allow. Dens go into embankments, under sheds, or into remodeled woodchuck burrows, and the records from Gettysburg National Military Park, Valley Forge, and Tyler State Park all sit in that same mixed country.
Spring is den season
Records climb from April through June, when vixens are nursing litters and the young begin playing at the den mouth in daylight. Both parents feed the kits, and by midsummer the family splits its time between the den and short hunting forays, putting more foxes in view than at any other time of year.
Status in Pennsylvania
NatureServe treats the red fox as non-native in Pennsylvania and assigns it SNA, a rank not applicable to exotic populations. Whatever its ancestry, the fox is fully naturalized and self-sustaining here, and the IUCN lists the species as Least Concern globally.
Full species profile
