I am trying to get in a little more exercise in an effort to lose some weight. Yesterday, I decided to walk for 45 minutes. Tippy’s usual walk is only about 25 minutes. In an effort to extend the time and not get bored, I walked places back in the fields that we don’t usually go. I still had 15 minutes left when we got back to the house, so, I did laps up and down the driveway.
On the first lap, Tippy came running past me – I’m convinced, just to show off – and went under the fence into the neighbor’s field. On my way back, I was startled by something running down the hill and into the driveway. It was a squirrel, which, upon seeing me, was just as startled as I was. We stared at each other a few seconds and then he did his horror film impression (darting back and forth in the road) before running on down the hill into the woods.
On my next lap, I heard a noise in the woods, looked down, and saw it was Tippy. She let out an excited little bark and then took off running. I figured she was chasing the squirrel, so was surprised when I saw a red fox come streaking across the driveway in front of me with Tippy right on it’s tail. I yelled at her, but, she was so intent on chasing the fox that I’m sure she didn’t even hear my voice. I was just wasting my breath.
I was a little bit concerned about how far/long she would chase this new intruder into her territory. But, fortunately, she came back in less than 5 minutes. Since everything happened so fast, I didn’t get any pictures of the actual chase. I did, however, get some pictures of Tippy when she got back.
In case you have never seen one, here is a picture of a red fox. They are actually a pretty animal and help keep the the squirrel and rabbit populations in check.
We never know what we are going to see when we go for a walk. That’s one thing I love about living out in the country!
Seeing the fox running made me think of the song “Fox on the Run” by Sweet, which I grew up listening to, hence the name of this blog post. Here is the video, if you would like to listen.