ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2024
Effect of skull morphology on fox snow diving.
Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2024. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 4 papers.
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Who cites it
4 citing papers in PubMed.
- A spinal substrate for modular control of natural behavior.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Welfare of American mink, red and Arctic foxes, raccoon dog and chinchilla kept for fur production.EFSA journal. European Food Safety Authority · 2025Article
- Penetration of fox and human skulls into granular matter: Oversimplifying a complex phenomenon?Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2024Article
- Reply to Martínez-Ortíz et al.: High moment of inertia of foxes inhibits their rotation.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2024Article
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Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Certain fox species plunge-dive into snow to catch prey (e.g., rodents), a hunting mechanism called mousing. Red and arctic foxes can dive into snow at speeds ranging between 2 and 4 m/s. Such mousing behavior is facilitated by a slim, narrow facial structure. Here, we investigate how foxes dive into snow efficiently by studying the role of skull morphology on impact forces it experiences. In this study, we reproduce the mousing behavior in the lab using three-dimensional (3D) printed fox skulls dropped into fresh snow to quantify the dynamic force of impact. Impact force into snow is modeled using hydrodynamic added mass during the initial impact phase. This approach is based on two key facts: the added mass effect in granular media at high Reynolds numbers and the characteristics of snow as a granular medium. Our results show that the curvature of the snout plays a critical role in determining the impact force, with an inverse relationship. A sharper skull leads to a lower average impact force, which allows foxes to dive head-first into the snow with minimal tissue damage.
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