NARRATOR: Here in Oregon's Central Cascade Mountains,
wildlife biologist Jamie Bowles is in search of a tiny fox.
There we go.
[device crackling]
Starting to pick it up a little bit.
I'm up here looking for a particular fox, it's SNRF,
so the Sierra Nevada red fox, number 38.
NARRATOR: Most folks are familiar with red foxes.
They're commonly found around the world,
but the species of red fox
that Jamie is trying to find here,
the Sierra Nevada red fox, is both rare and elusive.
There's very, very little known
about the Sierra Nevada red fox.
In fact, the bulk of the research has been done
here in Oregon, just during the last three years.
NARRATOR: The beeping antenna tool
that Jamie is using is common to wildlife biology.
It's called radio telemetry.
Telemetry is a lot like being a mountain goat.
[telemetry beeping]
NARRATOR: She previously captured
the individual fox she calls SNRF 38
and placed a transmitting radio collar on it.
Now she's trying to get close enough to the fox
to be able to download the data
that the collar has been recording.
He's tucked himself up into the tree line.
Telemetry, I think is very fun to do
because you're having to adjust the gain on your receiver
to find that exact tone that you're looking for.
The perfect tone when I'm in proximity sounds a certain way.
And so I've sort of cued my ear to that.
[telemetry beeping]
And what I'm looking for
is has the fox shifted in direction?
Am I still getting closer?
Or has the fox now turned and the fox is behind me?
He just came out
up around here.
He's just skirting right beside us.
I'm always trying to figure out exactly what it is
that they're thinking.
I think they're at least four steps ahead of me.
I know which direction the fox is in
and the proximity that it is for me, is he close, is he far?
Is he moving away? Is he moving closer?
But somehow you've just keeps managing to get away from me
or hiding in plain sight.
NARRATOR: One of the reasons Sierra Nevada red foxes
are so hard to see is because of their small size.
They are only 6 to 10 pounds.
Now I think this is really fascinating
because my cat is larger than these foxes.
NARRATOR: The other thing
that makes Sierra Nevada red foxes so hard
to see is their color.
Although Sierra Nevada red foxes are red foxes by species,
they're not necessarily red in color.
They're often black, gray and tan,
blending perfectly into the forest.
They do know that they are small enough
and they're dark enough.
They know what to blend into.
That if they don't wanna be seen,
they're not gonna make themselves known.
NARRATOR: SNRF 38 has quietly slipped around Jamie
and headed to higher ground.
They certainly don't lack for escape up here.
NARRATOR: These foxes are montane,
meaning they live in mountains.
There are three subspecies named
for the major mountain ranges of the west:
Rocky Mountain red foxes, Cascade red foxes,
and the Sierra Nevada red foxes.
Biologists knew there were montane foxes
in the Central Cascades,
but it was assumed they were Cascade red foxes
until DNA tests of hair samples revealed
that the foxes were actually Sierra Nevada red foxes.
In 2016, a trail camera captured
what is likely the very first images
of a Sierra Nevada red fox family at their den.
The dad, called the Todd, has returned with a meal,
while the young kits play, and the mother Vixen keeps watch.
Of the three montane subspecies of red foxes,
the Sierra Nevada red fox is the one
with the smallest population size.
And so it was really special
to find out that here in the Cascades of Oregon,
that we have this particular sub-species.
NARRATOR: The population that lives
in the Sierras Mountains, near Yosemite,
is estimated to be as few as 15,
putting them on the endangered species list.
But no one actually knows
how many Sierra Nevada red foxes live in Oregon.
Up to now, so little has been known about them,
that anything Jamie can learn is new information.
You know that they're somewhere around you,
but somehow I'm just never prepared.
Like I have my phone with me
and I'll just catch something out of the side of my eye
and there will be the fox and I'll be fumbling
to get my camera out.
And if I'm lucky, maybe I'll be able to get a video
or a very blurry shot of a critter
just boot scootin' just right out of range.
You do end up with all these videos
and it's like Sasquatch, they're all shaky.
And you're like, "Oh no, I swear it's a fox.
And I know it looks really blurry but I promise."
NARRATOR: Other people sometimes catch
unexpected glimpses of montane red foxes.
MAN: You're not gonna believe this.
Look what I'm looking at right now.
Look at him.
What a beautiful animal.
And then these are all the photos
that get submitted to me.
This was a photo from somebody
that was driving on the Cascade Lakes highway
and there was a fox hanging out, side of the road.
Crazy, huh? Camouflage.
Here's a good example of how different they look
during the summer.
I mean, shorter pelts for sure.
Not a poofy tail.
NARRATOR: The data that Jamie downloads
from the radio collars are helping fill in the map,
revealing new scientific insights about the foxes.
And the first question, where are they and where do they go?
Where are they hanging out?
Are they staying concentrated in one area
or do they go and find other areas for prey sources
or in search of a mate or another territory to disperse to?
And these are sort of their routes that they're going.
So each of these angles would be one data point
moving to another data point.
And so now what we're discovering
is that they do move long distances.
I mean, we'll see in a day,
I have a particular individual move 14 to 16 miles
in one day, and that's something we didn't know before.
And I think we're just at the tip
of really discovering exactly what these foxes can do.
My dream would be to start filling in those areas,
to really see how many foxes we might have here in Oregon.
NARRATOR: If Jamie can capture another fox
and place a radio collar on it,
she increases the chances of collecting more valuable data.
But the Sierra Nevada red foxes are just as hard to trap
as they are to track.
So it's not as easy as you just set a trap out
and put some bait in it.
And then the next day, bam, you're gonna have a fox.
I mean, it could be months in between captures.
All right, now it's ready.
NARRATOR: As Jamie makes her rounds,
she finds several of her traps have failed,
or been sprung by other animals.
Came to the very last trap with the trap line
and there's something in it, but it wasn't a fox.
[marten growling]
NARRATOR: Instead of a fox,
Jamie finds another small carnivore of the forest,
a feisty marten.
[marten growling]
Which is exciting to see
because you get to see one of those up close, which is cool.
But now I just went through all that effort
and a big walk around and yet outfoxed again.
Hey, dude.
Go ahead.
So out of about 5,600 trap nights
that we had up until the end of June,
we'd captured about 15 foxes,
so, 3% success rate.
Yeah, typical day.
NARRATOR: After miles and miles of walking in circles,
it's nearing the end of the day.
This is one of the very last days
of the summer field season,
and Jamie is still trying to pinpoint the only fox
that currently has a collar on, SNRF 38.
So he's down here in this thick stand of trees.
He's not far from us.
I can hear it both directions.
[telemetry beeping]
He's not far from us.
He's right there.
You can see the bush moving.
Oh, there he is. There he is.
There he is, there he is right there.
NARRATOR: At last, SNRF 38.
At least a glimpse.
It's him. And then he is gone.
Darn you, sly fox. You outfoxed me yet again.