One of the rarest mammals in North America, the Sierra Nevada red fox, was recently caught on camera twice inside Yosemite National Park.
The two sightings on remote wildlife cameras, on Dec. 13, 2014 and Jan. 4 of this year, mark the first time the Vulpes vulpes necator has been seen inside the park in nearly a century, the National Park Service said in a news release.
The animal, a subspecies of the red fox that’s native to the Sierra Nevada mountains, is so rare that no one is certain just how many are left. They are solitary creatures, nocturnal, do not travel in groups and avoid people, making them even harder to track and study. However, it’s believed the total population is less than 50.
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The fox’s population has been shrinking since the 1930s, although it’s not clear why. The Sierra Nevada Red Fox Interagency Working Group said habitat destruction and fragmentation, diseases from domestic dogs and competition with other species such as coyotes could all be playing a role.
Travelers in the Sierra Nevada and Cascade mountain ranges are encouraged to report red fox sightings to the California Department of Fish and Wildlife via this website, which also shows the difference between the red fox and similar animals.
