young polar foxes: cannibalism

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life is hard out there and the juxtaposition between the cub tenderness and the savagery of the cannibalism give an idea of the complexity of the Nature. Great shot, indeed. Compliments (6/7 anon)

 

Mauro

!!!!!

5/7!

Interesting... First, I though they both were playing like other youg foxes do... Closer, the scene is quite different. I would be interested in knowing what causes the death?

 

Is cannibalism coming from opportunism in their behaviours, or has the first killed the second in order to eat it?

 

(If you have time, you also can send me the answer by mail klysphotography@photo.net)

I slept in a cabin above the fox-den, and followed their development during 6 weeks in summer. First there were five small pubs, but it seemed that in the beginning of the season there was not enough food the mother could catch, so they stayed really small and eventually 3 of the 5 cubs died. This was a really intense scene, where the remaining cubs ate one of the dead ones. I don't think they killed it, but that it had died of malnutrition...

ok...thank you for the answer...

 

And another question if you have time : did the mother also ate the dead?

I did not see her eat the dead cubs.. but maybe she did..