Friends of the Island Fox

Island Fox F257 is Back and Beautiful at Middle Age

Friends of the Island Fox ·

2024/09/03

F257 August 2024Channel Island National Park biologists are on Santa Rosa Island this week capturing island foxes, counting them, checking their health, and updating radio-tracking collars. Biologist Juliann Schamel contacted FIF with great news: Female island fox 257 was captured for the 5th year in a row and she's looking great! Here's Juliann's update:F257 was born in 2019, and has spent her entire life in her natal area,which overlooks the East Point estuary [as] Santa Cruz Island floats on the

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FIF 2024 Trip To Santa Cruz Island

Friends of the Island Fox ·

2024/08/07

What do these smiling people have in common?They joined Friends of the Island Fox on a trip to Santa Cruz IslandJoin in the Fun and Experience Island Foxes in the WildSaturday, September 14, 2024We'll check-in at Ventura Harbor at 8 amand return around 5 pmThe $78 registration fee includes: boat fare, FIF naturalist guides on the island, and a donation to support island fox conservation.It's a full day of exploring Santa Cruz Island and each trip has unique experiences. an island fox follows a

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Fox Foto Friday - Island Foxes Being Counted

Friends of the Island Fox ·

2024/08/03

What's the word from the northern Channel Islands?NPS biologist Juliann Schamel says the "season is going well so far, we just caught our 100th fox of the seasonyesterday!"If you look closely, you can see the dark squared-off battery end of a radio collar beneath the chin of the captured island fox.Friends of the Island Fox funded its 417th radio-tracking collar last month. New radio collars arrived for deployment on three islands!Your donations provide radio collars to monitor island fox survival

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Radio Collars Arrive for Summer Health Checks!

Friends of the Island Fox ·

2024/07/09

You Did It!These refurbished radio collars are being prepared for deployment during island fox health checks on San Miguel Island in the next few weeks.The Channel Islands National Park fox biologists tie bright pink ribbons on radio collars and mark the ribbon with the collar's ID number and radio frequency. Pink makes it easy to find the collar in a dark backpack. The ribbon can quickly be removed and the information on it entered into field notes, after the island fox has been released.Having the

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Fox Foto Friday - Island Foxes as Seed Dispersers

Friends of the Island Fox ·

2024/07/06

What do these year-old toyon plants have in common?They were grown from seeds found in island fox scat.FIF talks about island foxes eating native plant fruits and spreading the seeds across the islands, but now there is scientific evidence that this seed dispersal can help island plants.Researchers Savannah Bartel and John Orrock from the Univ. of Wisconsin, Madison, were investigating the role social status plays in vertebrate dispersal of seeds. They collected island fox scat with toyon seeds and

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Fox Foto Friday - Keeping Vaccines Cool

Friends of the Island Fox ·

2024/06/29

How are colorful cooler bags and ice packs helping island foxes?Biologists at Channel Islands National Park will soon be heading out into the field to count island foxes and provide health checks. Part of that effort includes vaccinating island foxes and taking blood samples.Vaccines need to be kept cool going out into the field and biological samples need to be kept cool coming back.To maintain biosecurity for each island and reduce the opportunity for insects, viruses, parasites, or plant seeds to

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Island Fox Status Update 2024

Friends of the Island Fox ·

2024/05/31

In 2023, island fox populations remained healthy and stable across all six islands. Weather extremes, however, effected islands in different ways.Island fox on San Clemente Island courtesy of J. SanchezThe following is an update across the Channel Islands from notes compiled by Friends of the Island Fox at the Island Fox Conservation Working Group Meeting May 8, 2024 hosted at the Santa Barbara Zoo (hybrid meeting).Reported population numbers are the official estimates submitted by the land managers

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What is Island Fox Density?

Friends of the Island Fox ·

2024/05/17

Density is a term used in biology to express the number of individual living things in a given area. Biologists use a defined area size–ie. a square meter, square kilometer or square hectare–to quantify density. A square kilometer is equivalent to the footprint of Disneyland in southern California and a square hectare is equivalent to a professional baseball field.Understanding how many island foxes are living in a square kilometer is part of the calculation for estimating the size of an island-wide

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Date With A Fox - Island Fox Research with Juliann...

Friends of the Island Fox ·

2024/05/11

Friends of the Island Fox's Virtual Program on current island fox research."Date With A Fox"with guests Juliann Schamel and Dr. Alexandra DeCandiafrom Tuesday, April 30thThe April program highlighted current findings on island fox diet and microbiome. Microbiome investigations can help us understand how island foxes and island spotted skunks are using resources in the island ecosystem. Dietary investigations analyzing stable isotopes in whisker samples are revealing changes in island fox diet as

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Are Grapes Toxic to Island Foxes and Gray Foxes?

Friends of the Island Fox ·

2024/04/12

Recently, this question was posed to Friends of the Island Fox by a wildlife sanctuary that cares for gray foxes. Because gray foxes are wide-spread and considered common, little scientific research has evaluated their daily behavior, including diet. Island foxes, however, have been through periods of captive breeding when they faced near-extinction and there is a growing library of research on their diet and health. Since island foxes are recently descended from gray foxes, it stands to reason that

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Fox Foto Friday - Injured Island Fox Back on Her Feet

Friends of the Island Fox ·

2024/03/29

This young female island fox was discovered during capturing of island foxes for counting and health checks with a broken rear leg. Her story is one of multiple agencies, institutions, and a community of people working together to help her survive.Friends of the Island Fox and donors like you helped raise the $1,900 to pay for her specialized orthopedic surgery. Following her orthopedic evaluation on March 15, Julie Barnes, V.P. of Animal Care and Health at the Santa Barbara Zoo, reported that "the

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FIF Research Grant Application 2024

Friends of the Island Fox ·

2024/03/22

Friends of the Island Fox is currently taking applicationsthrough June 30 for theFIF 2024 Research GrantDownload Application From the complex relationship between island foxes and island spotted skunks, to diet, microbiome impacts on health, and changing territory sizes, research projects are revealing the complexities of the Channel Island ecosystem and the role of island foxes in island ecology.In 2024, Friends of the Island Fox is offering up to $7,000 in support to research projects benefiting

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FIF 2023 Research Grant to Investigate Individual...

Friends of the Island Fox ·

2024/03/15

FIF awarded a second Research Grant in 2023 to Juliann Schamel, NPS biologist and graduate student in Ecology and Conservation at University of Aberdeen, Scotland... Juliann Schamel in the field with island foxand Dr. Alexandria DeCandia, biology professor at Georgetown University... Dr. Alexandria DeCandiafor their project: From Microbes to Habitats: How Individual Fox Foraging Behavior Cascades Through an Ecosystem.Schamel and De Candia are combining their respective work in stable isotope diet

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Stable Isotopes Document Decade of Dietary Change in...

Friends of the Island Fox ·

2024/03/09

Juliann Schamel has been researching island fox diet using stable isotopes in whisker samples since 2018. Friends of the Island Fox has supported the processing of whisker samples through several Research Grants. In November of 2023, Schamel presented the following poster of her latest work at the California Islands Symposium.Using Stable Isotopes to Assess a Decade of Dietary Resource Use in Two Sympatric Island Endemics: The Island Fox and the Island Spotted Skunk (link to complete poster)Island

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You Did It! You Gave An Island Fox a Second Chance!

Friends of the Island Fox ·

2024/02/26

Thank you to our donors - near and far!Over the past three days, you've responded with overwhelming support and raised the funds to pay for special orthopedic surgery needed for this young injured island fox. Her storyThank you to: FIF's long-time donorsOur Instagram followersOur "X" followers especially our "Hijinkai" who love island foxes from afar in JapanYou all have helped to give this island fox a second chance on life.

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Injured Island Fox Pup Gets Second Chance

Friends of the Island Fox ·

2024/02/23

You can help this young island foxFriends of the Island Fox is raising funds to pay for her orthopedic surgeryDuring the annual fall 2023 counting and island fox health checks on San Nicolas Island, biologists discovered this female pup with a recently injured right hind leg. The bones just above her foot, the metatarsal bones, had been fractured and the wound was open.The injury was too severe for treatment on the remote Navy island. According to our friends with the U.S. Navy and the Santa Barbara

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Unexpected Creatures During Island Fox Counting - Part 4

Friends of the Island Fox ·

2024/01/25

Welcome guest blogger Jessica Sanchez, wildlife veterinarian and FIF Board Member. She's explained how island foxes are captured annually in Part 1, shown how a fox's body condition is evaluated in Part 2, and demonstrated health procedures preformed on island foxes during an annual health check in Part 3. As she explains, she might be out capturing island foxes, but they aren't the only animals she encounters.We also catch island spotted skunks, although this has become rarer in recent years.You

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Island Fox Gets a Health Check - Part 3

Friends of the Island Fox ·

2024/01/22

Welcome guest blogger Jessica Sanchez, wildlife veterinarian and FIF Board Member. She's explained how island foxes are captured annually in Part 1 and shown how a fox's body condition is evaluated in Part 2. But an island fox health check includes additional health measures.We check the foxes for ectoparasites such as ticks, fleas, mites, and lice. We comb their fur to find fleas, and pay special attention to their ears, armpits, and belly area–where lice and ticks are often found.Ticks are

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An Island Fox Gets a Health Check - Part 2

Friends of the Island Fox ·

2024/01/19

Welcome guest blogger Jessica Sanchez, wildlife veterinarian and FIF Board Member. In Part 1, she explained how island foxes are captured annually. Now, she'll take us through an island fox health check.As biologists and veterinarians, we carefully remove the fox from the box trap, being sure not to get their tail caught in the door!Island foxes are blindfolded to help keep them calm and reduce stress. Foxes do not have any natural predators on the Channel Islands so they are very brave, but they

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How Do Biologists Capture Island Foxes?

Friends of the Island Fox ·

2024/01/17

Meet guest blogger, FIF Board Member, Jessica Sanchez.Sanchez is a wildlife veterinarian and epidemiologist who's been working with Channel Island foxes since 2006. She started her career managing the captive breeding and wild fox monitoring program on Santa Cruz Island. For her master's degree, she researched social interactions among island foxes, and modeled vaccination and monitoring methods to prevent and detect disease outbreaks. She is currently a consulting veterinarian for island foxes

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