It started as a rainy afternoon with nowhere to be. My wife Kate, our son, and I had a free few hours and needed to get out of the house. So we made the drive — about an hour and a half — to a national wildlife refuge on the Delaware shore.
The refuge is the kind of place that rewards patience and repeat visits. Migratory birds in abundance: eagles, ospreys, ducks, geese, shorebirds. Seasonally, Short-eared Owls and Harriers work the fields at dusk — I missed them this year, but there's always next season. And most years, if you know where to look and get lucky with timing, there's a fox den somewhere in the park with a new litter of kits.
The den location is deliberately kept off social media by the local photography community — and for good reason. Too many people, too close, too often does real harm. So we went without coordinates, without a tip. Just research, a basic understanding of fox behavior and habitat, and a willingness to keep looking.
By our third loop through the park the sky had cleared. The rain clouds had given way to actual sunshine, and we were genuinely happy with the day — a nice outing, beautiful day, time outside. We were wrapping up, talking about where to get dinner on the way home, when I caught a flicker of movement at the edge of the road ahead.
I pulled over fast, jumped out with the camera already in hand, and started shooting.
A mother fox was trotting down the edge of the road directly toward us — head low, eyes forward, on a mission. She was beautiful. The whole encounter lasted maybe twenty seconds, eight of which were me getting the truck stopped and the camera up. She passed within a few feet of the truck, paused, and looked back once — just long enough for me to get a few more frames.
SONY A7RV • Sony 200-600 @ 600mm • f/6.3 • ISO 2000 • 1/3200 • Edit in Lightroom
SONY A7RV • Sony 200-600 @ 400mm • f/5.3 • ISO 2500 • 1/3200 • Edit in Lightroom
field tips
Always have your camera ready — settings dialed in before you need them. I keep mine set for fast action at all times: high shutter speed, auto ISO, wide aperture, center spot focus. That way I can put the camera up and fire a usable sharp frame in almost any situation. If you encounter something slow or static, you'll have time to adjust. If you encounter something fast, you won't. Default to ready.
I pulled over, grabbed the camera and tripod, and walked up. Three fox kits. Tiny, fluffy, impossibly cute — playing in the grass just off the road, no more than thirty feet away. Completely unbothered by us. Blissfully, joyfully living their best little foxy lives.
SONY A7RV • Sony 200-600 @ 600mm • f/6.3 • ISO 4000 • 1/3200 • Edit in Lightroom
For the next thirty or forty minutes I took some of my favorite photographs I've ever made. The kits played, wrestled, napped in the sun, ran in and out of the den, and paused occasionally to stare at us with that wide-eyed, ears-forward curiosity that makes fox kits almost impossible to look at without smiling. Mama and Papa came through too — checking in, dropping off food, keeping an eye on their chaotic little family.
It was one of those moments where you stop thinking about settings and composition and just feel grateful to be standing there. After a while I waved Kate and our son up from the truck. Watching him watch the kits — that was its own kind of image. One I didn't need a camera for.
So there you have it... an amazing outing, and a few good reminders!
- Sometimes it's worth going out even when conditions are unfavorable.
- It never hurts to do one more loop — wildlife are unpredictable and sometimes it's just dumb luck to hit the timing right.
- And ALWAYS have your camera close and ready.