The gray fox (Urocyon cinereoargenteus) is a mammal of the order Carnivora ranging throughout most of the southern half of North America from southern Canada to the northern part of South America (Venezuela and Colombia). This species and the closely related Channel Island fox (Urocyon littoralis) are the only living members of the genus Urocyon, which is considered to be among the most primitive of the living canids. Though it was once the most common fox in the east, and still is found there, human advancement allowed the red fox to become more dominant. The Pacific States still have the gray fox as a dominant. Its specific epithet cinereoargenteus means 'ashen silver'.
Read more about Gray Fox: Origin, Description and Behavior, Reproduction, Diet, Subspecies
Famous quotes containing the words gray and/or fox:
“Remember? We sat on a slab of rock.
From this distance in time,
it seems the color
of iris, rotting and turning purpler,
but it was only
the usual gray rock”
—Robert Lowell (1917–1977)
“His berd as any sowe or fox was reed,
And therto brood, as though it were a spade.
Upon the cop right of his nose he hade
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Reed as the brustles of a sowes erys.
His nosethirles blake were and wyde.”
—Geoffrey Chaucer (1340?–1400)