Lean Vixen is a red fox who appears in the books and apeers to be the main antagonist Farthing Wood: The Adventure Begins
Farthing Wood: The Adventure Begins[]
She calls for her mate, Lean Fox, when she finds the Farthing Wood Otters poaching on her hunting grounds, killing shrews, voles and field mice, and he tries to chase them away, but the two are only taunted and they fail to get the otters off their land.
Lean Vixen waits by the stream for Sleek Otter and her cubs to return to her holt, but they bypass her and when she tries to locate the entrance to the holt, Smooth Otter shoves her into the ice cold water of the stream and Lean Vixen is assaulted violently by the otters, and left covered in scars. She barely escapes and plans to get her own revenge on the otters.
- "Conceited, vain buffoons. I'm not finished yet. They won't be jeering next time. A bit of old-fashioned fox cunning is what's needed: the badger was right. There's more than one smart animal in Farthing Wood."
- — Lean Vixen about the otters
And she quickly does get her revenge, with the help of Sly Stoat, Lean Vixen tricks the otters into eating many parasite-infected voles. Several of them, including Sleek Otter's cubs die painful deaths before Smooth Otter tells them how to cure themselves, and the otters return to the Wood when food becomes scarce in the stream again.
Lean Vixen gets into a tug-of-war with Smooth Otter over a pheasant and gives him and Slow Otter a threat to their and the otter population's lives:
- "You stupid animal. Do you plan to wrest our food from our very jaws? What kind of madness will you get up to next? Be warned. You too. Try those sort of tricks again and we foxes will drive you from the Wood!"
- — Lean Vixen to Smooth Otter and Slow Otter
Smooth Otter does not heed her warning and he ends up getting killed for fighting with Lean Fox and bleeds to death. During the attack, Lean Vixen leads a group of foxes, with Stout Fox after the otters and all the otters but several are savaged or killed by the foxes and driven from the Wood. Lean Vixen claims that it had to be done so the Wood could be peaceful again, but Stout Fox wishes it could have been done with less savagery and they part their ways.
After the deaths of Quick Weasel and Wily Stoat, Lean Vixen isn't worried about all the humans in Farthing Wood, and is only worried about keeping her new born cubs safe from them and the sickness and claims that is all they have to worry about
After a rain storm, Lean Fox and Vixen go hunting rabbits through the muddy field outside of the Wood and he is caught in the mud, despite her warnings. Lean Vixen is caught when the bank collapses and falls into the mud and is buried alive with Lean Fox, leaving her cubs to fend for themselves. Her body is seen floating in the mud with Lean Fox in the morning by Nervous Squirrel and Jay and their deaths are described as "a hole in Farthing Wood".
- "Dead foxes! Dead rabbits! Who's next? Who's next?"
- — Jay about the lean foxes' deaths
Personality[]
Lean Vixen is shown to be a selfish vixen, not caring about the humans appearing in Farthing Wood and only caring about herself and her cubs.
Appearances
- Books
Gallery[]
| Characters from Farthing Wood: The Adventure Begins |
|---|
| Main Characters |
| Stout Fox • Stout Vixen • Long-Whiskers • Lean Fox • Lean Vixen • Sly Stoat |
| Major Secondary Characters |
| Lightning Weasel • Sleek Otter • Lame Otter • Quick Weasel • Wily Stoat • Sage Hedgehog |
| Antagonists |
| Slow Otter • Smooth Otter |
| Minor Characters |
| Kindly Badger • Jay • Nervous Squirrel • Young Badger • Otter Cubs • Farthing Wood Otters • Unnamed fox cub • Owl |