Lucky, aka The Cudahy Fox, was one of eight fox cubs that grew up in a neighborhood in Cudahy, where residents fed them hot dogs and bacon (not recommended), and the not-so-lucky cub somehow got his right paw trapped in the jaws of a wicked mousetrap set up outside (also not recommended). By the time a neighbor had captured him and brought him in to the Wisconsin Humane Society’s Wildlife Rehabilitation Center, the paw was a swollen, bloody mess and infested with maggots. In the end, however, Lucky held true to his name and lost only small segments of two toes as he convalesced over a month and a half, with no small thanks due to the donated raccoon fur coat that he adopted as his bed. In mid-October, Scott Diehl, director of the Rehabilitation Center, drove Lucky out to Warnimont Park in Cudahy and released him in front of a small crowd of neighbors and TV cameras. The sure-footed fox hesitated to step outside of his fur-coat-lined carrier, and when he did, he looked around confusedly before trotting off into the weeds. Kristy Adams, daughter of the woman who discovered the original den, said the fox family had “kind of brought everyone together.”
Photo by Adam Ryan Morris.
Wild Encounter
A foxy story.
