Chapter 167 Arctic Fox (VII)
From April to June in the Arctic, as seabirds return in large numbers, Arctic fox cubs are born one after another.
Yu Yijun spread out his paws, chasing a snow goose while running and flapping his wings, trying to use the frightened bird's bouncing power to fly into the sky and be shoulder to shoulder with it.
“Ga ga~”
The snow goose relied on its wings and thought that the Arctic fox could not catch it, so it flew very low on purpose to tease him, making hoarse mocking sounds.
“Oh…”
The cunning little fox cried deliberately, looking pitiful, weak and helpless, to lure the snow geese to fly lower and lower.
Finally, when it flew into the attack range of the little fox, Zhu Wang jumped up suddenly and grabbed the snow goose's wing in one bite.
Xueyan:? ? ?
You are playing me!
The movie star fox carried the hard-earned spoils and ran back to his nest.
As soon as he approached the nest, Yu Yiyun heard the fox cries once, twice, three times, and finally four times, which must be the birth of its cubs.
At this moment, the naive Pig Wang has not realized the seriousness of the matter and is immersed in the joy of being a big brother.
"Ying!" My younger brother and sister are born!
"Oh~" It's great. I like rubbing the little puppy the most~
The fox who loves to rub little puppies the most in the whole universe happily crawls into the nest, and then -
After seeing the situation inside Chaoxue, Yu Yiyun's smile slowly disappeared.
I really want to escape.
But can't escape.
A newborn Arctic fox is very cute, weighing about 50 grams, with only a thin layer of lanugo on its body, with patches of white and black.
The varying looks of the fox cubs were not the reason why Yu Yiyun’s smile froze.
When the polar day begins, her hair gradually sheds, turning from a beautiful girl into a mixed-hair little dog.
All the foxes in the Arctic should be ugly together. There is no need to hurt each other.
What Yu Yiyun couldn't accept was——
Can someone tell me what's going on with the bunch of grapes under the fox mom's belly? !
Judging from the fluffiness of the cubs' fur, they have been born for some time and must drink milk as soon as possible.
Since the fox mother has a limited number of cubs, there are only six feeding positions in total.
All the Arctic fox cubs huddled under their mother's belly, their eyes barely open yet, and they pushed and shoved like little bugs, using their little paw pads to push other foxes away, sucking with their toothless mouths and squeezing the milk with their tender paws like mad.
A few weak cubs couldn't snatch the attention of other foxes, so they cried loudly in a hurry, trying to attract their mother's attention.
When there are few cubs, the mother may take the initiative to feed the cubs that cannot get milk.
But there were too many foxes in the den, and the mother couldn't get away at all. She could only let the cubs beg for food at the top of their lungs.
The mortality rate of Arctic foxes is particularly high in the first two days after birth.
A large number of cubs succumbed to the cruel laws of nature before they even opened their eyes.
Yu Yijun hurriedly picked up the snow goose, plucked its feathers and handed it to the fox mother, then counted the cubs in the dim light.
“Boo, boo, boo… boo.”
1, 2, 3...15.
Yu Yiyun took a rough inventory and his expression gradually became bitter.
[I dare not open my eyes, I hope it is my hallucination.jpg]
right!
It must be an illusion!
Even if Arctic foxes are very fertile, giving birth to fifteen or sixteen foxes in two consecutive litters is still a low-probability event, right?
Zhu Wang didn't believe it, blinked his eyes, and decided to count again.
At the same time, the two cubs who had been vying for the feeding position in the lower row and were pressed tightly by their brothers and sisters finally drank their fill of milk and came out with their round little bellies in their hands to burp.
Yu Yiyun's eyelids twitched, and he had a feeling that things were not going well.
Soon, his premonition came true.
Professor Yu, who often scored full marks in mathematics when he was in school, counted carefully five times.
After removing the highest score and then the lowest score, the final number was '17'. Yu Yiyun felt as if his eyes were dark.
Um.
It’s definitely not fifteen or sixteen.
It’s sixteen or seventeen, hahaha!
Yu Yiyun's face was filled with joy and her mental state was quite good.
He turned his dog face and stared numbly at the cubs that looked like bunches of grapes. For the first time in his life, the evil thought of "letting them fend for themselves" came to his mind.
Just when Yu Dehua was trying to give up and leave his huge cub to natural selection.
A few cubs couldn't get a place to feed from their mother, so they followed the smell and heat, crawled to their brother with difficulty, and dived into his arms.
"Hmm..."
The little puppy, whose eyes were not yet open, rubbed it gently.
"Hmm."
He opened his toothless mouth wide, sucked on Yu Yiyun's hair, and sucked with all his strength.
The Arctic fox has dense fur and its abdomen is covered with fine fur.
In order to feed her cubs, mother foxes will use their mouths to pluck the fur around their anus to make it easier for their cubs to find the feeding spot.
The puppies sucked for a long time, but only got a mouthful of dog hair, whining in grievance.
"Hmm." Brother.
"Hungry." Hungry.
The puppies huddled together pitifully, rubbing against each other, begging for food from the big fox in their baby voices, their desire to survive being particularly strong.
"!!!"
The softest part of Yu Yiyun's heart was deeply touched!
Even though Yu Yiyun knew, the survival rate of wild Arctic foxes was less than 10%.
In other fox dens, the weak cubs have no choice but to die, giving the stronger cubs a greater chance of survival.
Even though the fox father and mother were diligent enough, nearly half of the cubs in the previous litter still starved to death.
It is almost an impossible task to feed all the fox cubs.
But how do you know if you don’t try?
Isn’t it the essence of passionate youth comics to do something even though you know it’s impossible?
Yu Yiyun was so excited for a while, then made up her mind and walked out of the nest without looking back.
Arctic fox cubs must rely on milk for nutrition for the first two months after birth.
Based on the amount of milk the mother fox secretes now, it is definitely not enough to feed 17 cubs.
If you want all the fox cubs to have enough milk, in addition to letting the mother fox take in more nutrients, you must also consider other sources of milk.
The weak cubs are already very hungry and need to consume calories to resist the cold.
If it had been delayed a little longer, 17 might have really become 15.
Yu Yiyun didn't have time to think too much, and caught a few lemmings nearby to feed them to the fox mother, so that she could secrete as much milk as possible.
Then, risking being tanned into a little black fox, they left the nest under the scorching sun and looked around for alternative sources of milk.
After searching for a while, Yu Yiyun found a long-legged Arctic hare and his eyes suddenly lit up.
Bunny!
Not only does the Arctic hare have the same fur color as the Arctic fox, its breeding and lactation cycles are also roughly the same. It's simply another me on earth.
I remember that in the animated film "Zootopia" released by Disney, a female rabbit and a male fox were paired together. It caused countless viewers to be very upset. They spent the whole night studying whether their cubs should be called fox-rabbit or rabbit-fox, and they didn't care about the existence of reproductive isolation at all.
In that case, what's wrong with feeding?
Although rabbits and foxes have different diets and the nutrients contained in their milk are different, they cannot be used as a long-term source of milk.
But in order to deal with the emergency in the short term, we can refer to the strategy of feeding pandas by humans and let the panda cubs drink a mixture of milk powder and breast milk, so that they can also absorb the various nutrients needed during the growth stage.
With evil thoughts in mind, Yu Yiyun scratched the nearby bare rocks, used his brown fur to hide his body, and followed the rabbit stealthily to the rabbit's nest.
April is the season when little rabbits are born.
Yu Yiyun searched for a while and easily smelled the scent of milk, then quietly ambushed near the baby rabbit.
The Arctic has plenty of sunlight during the polar day, and there are a lot of mosses and lichens in the summer.
Herbivorous rabbits are much more competitive for survival than Arctic foxes, so there are only 2-6 cubs in each litter.
Similar to Arctic foxes, rabbits can participate in reproduction in their first year of life.
In nature, in order to avoid natural enemies, the young of herbivorous animals grow very quickly.
The baby rabbit opens its eyes as soon as it is born and is able to move freely soon.
The mother rabbit does not need to be with her babies all the time. She only needs to feed them once every 18 hours. The rest of the time she can go outside to forage for food and chew grass roots, so the breastfeeding pressure is not that great.
Soon, the mother rabbit hopped back to the nest as usual, ready to feed her cubs.
It looked around vigilantly to prevent its cub from being exposed to other animals... ugh.
Mother Rabbit looked above the nest and saw a brown stone winking at her.
All right.
Already exposed.
During the raising period, rabbits tend to act alone, without a large group of people nearby to provide cover.
The mother rabbit was afraid that she would become food for the Arctic fox, so she turned around and ran away.
Today, the ice and snow in the tundra area have melted and will not pose a hindrance to the Arctic fox.
Not only do the two animals have the same color scheme, they also run at similar speeds, making them perfect for the show of one escaping and the other chasing.
Seeing the mother rabbit abandon her cubs and run away, Yu Yijun immediately rushed out like an arrow.
Although their speeds were similar, Yu Yiyun clearly had more experience in chasing prey, and he used both his teeth and claws to pin the Arctic hare under him.
“Puff!”
“Puff, puff, puff!”
The Arctic hare belongs to the family Leporidae. It is a very quiet animal and rarely makes any sounds.
Only when one is extremely frightened or in unbearable pain will a sound similar to jetting be made.
The mother rabbit was held down by the Arctic fox. She breathed in despair and thought her life was over.
The Arctic fox is so ferocious that it will definitely turn it into rabbit sashimi, rabbit platter, or rabbit family portrait.
If there is an afterlife, it hopes to be a rabbit in a place where there are no Arctic foxes.
Chengdu: Oh huh?
Learn about cold rabbit, dry pot rabbit, and spicy rabbit head~
No rabbit can leave Chengdu alive!
The rabbit, who doesn't understand the 'evilness of the world', is still making a simple wish.
Suddenly, the pain of its ear being pulled brought its consciousness back from the afterlife.
Yu Yiyun held the rabbit's ears, which were shorter than those of other rabbits but still very long, in her mouth, forcing the Arctic rabbit to follow her back to its nest.
Zhu Wang Basheng has caught countless rabbits and knows very well how to catch a rabbit and bring it back to the nest alive and well without hurting it.
Although the Arctic fox is small in size, the Arctic hare is too big to be picked up in the mouth.
But as long as you grab the rabbit's ears, you can control its life force just like grabbing a cat's neck.
“Puff!”
“Puff, puff, puff!”
The Arctic hare was pulled by its ears and breathed air all the way to the Arctic fox's den.
Smelling the strong scent of its natural enemy, the rabbit kicked its legs violently and refused to approach the fox's den.
What's wrong with this fox?
Torturing the prey?
"Bing!" Rabbit!
"Oh, oh, oh!" Our Arctic family should help each other, don't you think?
“Puff!”
The rabbit protested loudly!
Scumbag fox!
When you eat rabbits as rice, why don’t you say that the Arctic family should help each other!
If you have the guts, tell the wolf and the bear that they also have the surname Arctic.
Wolves and bears?
Oh, do you think Yu Yijun doesn’t dare?
The Arctic family has a good understanding of each other and they feed their cubs almost entirely during these two months.
But Xiongxiong was too big, and when the 50-gram fox was put into its arms, it flew away with just a move of its claws.
Wolfs are smaller than bears and closely related, but they are now at their most aggressive.
It is not easy to catch prey, and the cubs have to be fed, and their fur is falling off every day.
A bald wolf with lost hair would want to kick a passing ant, let alone the little fox who tries to catch its queen and feed her?
Besides, even if Yu Yiyun really caught the wolf queen, there was no way to put her into the fox den.
The ancestral fox foundation cannot collapse in one's own claws.
After much thought, I decided that rabbits, which are the most similar in size and easier to control, would be more suitable.
Yu Yiyun coaxed and deceived the rabbit into going back into the nest, which scared the mother fox.
You know, whenever the son and the fox father brought prey, they would bite it to death and feed it to her.
This time, we brought a living one back. Could it be that it is to cultivate her hunting ability and prevent the fox mother from staying in the nest for too long and her skills from degenerating?
The fox mother shook the fur ball on her body and was about to move over.
"Hiss!" Yu Yiyun issued a dangerous warning, signaling the fox mother not to come closer.
The fox mother felt puzzled, so she squatted where she was to see what her son was doing.
The few cubs that didn't get any milk smelled their brother's scent and crawled over using all their strength to drink milk.
Yu Yiyun held the rabbit down, controlling its head and one of its paws, forcing it to lie down with its belly exposed.
The foxes that came over closed their eyes, nudged the dog here and there, and sucked on the dog's hair.
"嘤!" Yu Yijun couldn't bear to watch it anymore, so he freed up a paw and pushed her under the rabbit.
"Puff!" Rabbit puffed and protested loudly.
At first, the puppy felt the rabbit's struggle and fluttering, and was too scared to get close.
After a while, the survival instinct overcame the fear, and a little puppy came over and drank the first mouthful of rabbit milk in the form of a cricket pupa.
Then the second one, the third one...
There was a very polite dog. He took two sips and then came over to rub against the rabbit.
"Hmm." Thank you, Mommy Rabbit~
For young animals, whoever gives them milk is their mother. They unilaterally regard the rabbit as their mother and pester it and act coquettishly.
The bunny's struggles gradually grew weaker, and he didn't know whether he was tired or just resigned to his fate.
Rabbit had been eating grass for more than ten hours, so the amount of milk was quite sufficient, and finally all the fox cubs were full of milk.
Yu Yiyun knew that the rabbit had its own cubs to take care of and had no intention of turning it into food.
He held the rabbit's ear, led it out of the fox's den, and considerately prepared to take it home.
After going around twice, the rabbit became impatient.
"Puff puff?" Do you know the way?
"Puff!" Get out!
The rabbit kicked him and ran away without looking back.
"Bing bing~" Goodbye Bunny~
"Oh, oh, oh!" I'll catch you next time I want to feed you!
The rabbit heard the demon whispering and cried out even louder.
Having said that, Yu Yiyun knew that always catching the rabbit to feed was not a solution.
Now that the cubs have had their first meal, they won’t starve to death so quickly, and Pig Wang has more time to think of countermeasures.
Just at this moment, the youngest sister who had gone out to find food came back with fat lemmings.
She fed the lemmings to their mother, and the fox cubs, who were reincarnated from starving ghosts, came to her youngest sister and begged for food.
Yu Yiyun poked his head into the nest, and was about to tell the fox cubs that the youngest sister had not entered the breeding period and could not breastfeed yet.
Unexpectedly, when the youngest sister saw the cubs approaching, she actually lay down skillfully and cleaned the bodies and combed the hair of her younger brothers and sisters one by one.
Yu Yiyun: ???
How come you are so skilled!
Yu Yiyun secretly observed the youngest sister and quickly found out the reason.
During the time when the mother fox did not give birth to cubs, the youngest sister was not idle either.
Before Fox Mom, her four sisters had started their own families.
Arctic foxes experiencing spring for the first time are not only less competitive than foxes in their prime, but they also do not have grown cubs to help raise their young.
They get married earlier than the mother fox, and their cubs are born earlier.
With her powerful hunting ability, the youngest sister feeds one and another every day and takes turns raising the children for her sisters.
Yu Yiyun watched helplessly as her youngest sister moved from one house to another, and felt that her status as "the best parent in the world" was challenged.
Apart from the insignificant damage to his dignity, Yu Yiyun discovered something important.
The number of first-born babies of her younger sisters was smaller than that of her mother.
The family with the least number of cubs, small No. 7, had only five cubs in the litter, and there were not even enough places for them to feed.
In that case...
That night, it was bright and windy, and Yu Yiyun took advantage of the clear night to secretly carry out the weakest cub in the nest.
He smelled the scent of Little 7 and the strange fox that had fought with Little 1, marking the edge of their territory, and then openly slipped into Little 6's arms.
Xiao 6: ...
It's broad daylight, clear sky, do you think I'm blind?
“Hmm.”
Yu Yiyun also felt aggrieved.
The North Pole has officially entered polar day, and even though he feels very nervous, he still looks calm.
Xiao 6 lowered his head and sniffed the scent of the new cub, recognizing it as mom and dad's cub, and in other words, his sister.
Not long after the cub period, Xiao Liu still remembers that he often went hungry and brought meat back to his fox father. He also remembers his companions who died of hunger one by one, and the fox mother who licked their bodies for a long time.
Little No. 6 didn't hesitate much. He raised his legs and let his sister, who was obviously two times smaller than the other cubs, arch under him to drink milk.
After a while, the male fox returned to the den, smelled a strange smell, and found a new cub in the den.
"Oh?" Wife?
The male fox tilted his head, and a trace of confusion appeared on the dog's face.
"Squeak!" We need to raise a few more puppies at home~
"Aoao!" Okay, then I'll catch more lemmings for you!
A light bulb lit up in the male fox's head. He crawled out of the nest and happily caught lemmings.
Although I don’t know why, I seem to have become a father painlessly~
Yu Yiyun followed the smell and observed the nests of his younger brothers. He compared and selected them carefully and distributed the cubs that could not be raised at home equally among them.
By forcibly controlling the gap between the rich and the poor, there are only 9 cubs left in the fox father and mother's den, the same as last year, and the number has finally reached a level that the fox mother can barely feed.
Fox Dad and Fox Mom were relieved, but Yu Dehua had a heavier burden.
As a responsible fox, he couldn't just hand his younger siblings over to them and then walk away.
The fox father and mother feel a lot of pressure in raising the cubs, and the younger brothers and sisters also feel a lot of pressure in raising the cubs.
They don't have the older cubs to help take care of the younger ones, and as the cubs' thirst for food grows, they may not even be able to feed their own cubs, let alone the cubs from outside.
In order to keep the cubs alive as long as possible, they must catch enough prey.
Summer in the Arctic is the most fertile season.
The 24-hour sunshine nourishes the land and keeps the grass and trees growing.
Birds and animals that depend on plants for survival also continue to thrive.
Arctic foxes, who are at the top of the food chain, are also at a time when they have the least shortage of prey.
Although there is no shortage of prey, it still requires skills to catch it.
A large number of seabirds flew back, and the Arctic foxes looked at the birds high in the sky, but they could do nothing but hope that their flightless chicks would hatch quickly.
Apart from--
A snow goose had just returned from foraging, and landed on the edge of the cliff with its wings folded, preparing to return to the nest to take over from its mate.
Suddenly, a large rock from the cliff "flew" over and accurately grabbed the snow goose's neck.
Before it could flap its wings, it had already become the fox's prey.
In the nest, the female goose, who couldn't wait for her mate, poked her head out. Before she could see what was happening outside, the stone below jumped up and bit her throat.
Yu Yiyun, who used his fur to disguise himself as a stone, easily killed two geese. He poked his head into the snow goose nest and dug out the eggs, which were still warm, one by one.
"Bing." Dandan, don't be sad~
"Oh!" I will send you to reunite with your parents right away. The family must be complete!
Xueyan and her family: ...Then I should thank you?
The Arctic foxes living on the cliffs by the sea found it unbelievable when they saw Yu Yiyun hunting snow geese.
How could a fox climb that high?!
When he jumped up to catch the snow goose, wasn't he worried about falling?
The strangest thing is, why do the snow geese fly over obediently when he whistles?
Soon, the foxes discovered that being able to catch snow geese was not this fox's greatest skill.
With the arrival of summer, the glaciers melt rapidly and the Arctic Ocean becomes a flowing sea again.
Animals in the ocean, such as seals, walruses, beluga whales, and sharks, have become active again.
The top hunters who rule all the seas from the Antarctic to the Arctic and possess high intelligence come in search of prey.
On the day when the nearby ocean completely melted, the bird-catching Arctic fox squatted quietly on the shore, looking at a big fish diving in the water in the distance, with a wolf-like light in its eyes.
The other foxes thought he was crazy.
The fish swim so fast that it is difficult for Arctic foxes, and even polar bears, to enter the ocean to hunt big fish after the glaciers melt.
The little fox was seen squatting quietly on the shore until a bigger wave came.
He suddenly jumped up and made a crisp sound of clips in the distance.
"嘤!" Fat Tiger!
"Oh!" Give me that fish!
"Eeh!" I told you last year that we are killer whales, not fat tigers!
"Gugu." You're so annoying, I won't help you catch fish.
"Hmm?" Fat Tiger, have you ever eaten rabbit?
“…Eh?” What is that?
Yu Yiyun went behind the rock and took out the little rabbit that he had hidden long ago.
"Oh!" Rabbit, isn't it cute!
"Gugu!" Cute, I want to eat it~
"Yingying!" You give me fish and I give you rabbit!
"Gugu~" Okay, okay~
This group of killer whales are all carnivorous killer whales and have little interest in marine fish.
Killer whales roam all over the sea, and they never encounter any fins when they flick their tails.
However, due to physical limitations, he is unable to explore the map on land.
Hearing that the Arctic fox, which could speak whale language, was willing to catch animals on land for it, the curious killer whale immediately agreed, raised its tail and slapped the big fish to the shore.
Yu Yiyun was very considerate. She not only plucked the rabbit hair for them, but also tore it into pieces that were easy to swallow, so as to prevent the big eggplants from wearing out their teeth.
"Eh." The rabbit was too small to taste anything.
"Gu gu~" Dog, I give you fish and you give me rabbit!
"Ying!" Okay Fat Tiger!
"Eeh!" I told you, I'm not Fat Tiger!
The big eggplant under the sea broke through the defense!
“…嘤.”
Yu Yijun cried out weakly.
——Am I a dog then?
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