The animal itself
Foxes appear to use the earth's magnetic field to judge distance when pouncing on prey under snow, striking most successfully when facing north-east. One of the few documented cases of an animal using magnetism to aim.1 of 2 calendars · 4,400 searches a month
Fox
The fox is read as cleverness applied to obstacles. It appears in one of the two birth calendars we cover. The two are presented online as interchangeable, yet they name the same animal on only 17 days of 365 — 4.7% of the year.
Which calendar assigns it, and when
Celtic calendar
18 March – 14 April
Its tree
Alder
Only the Celtic calendar assigns this one. Anyone born in these dates gets a different animal from the other system — the two agree on 4.7% of days →
What it stands for, and where that came from
Cleverness applied to obstacles — the route around rather than through.
Honoured in: Japanese kitsune as shapeshifter and messenger of Inari; Aesop as the trickster; Finnish myth has the fox creating the northern lights with its tail.
Counted across all 39 animals
Where the fox sits
22/39
animals here carry a birth-date range. The other 17 are symbols
people choose, not ones a date assigns.
4.7%
of the year — 17 days out of 365 —
is where the two calendars name the same animal. The rest of the time they
disagree.
2nd
most looked-up of the 39 animals we cover.
Both calendars are published online as though interchangeable. They are not, and the disagreement is the reason two sites can give you different animals for the same birthday. How the two calendars differ →
Searched about as often
Fox is ranked 2 of 39 by search demand. Of all 39 animals here, 22 sit in one of the two birth-date calendars and 17 are searched as symbols only.