Free Republic

The odd-looking animal spotted in several Piedmont counties last year evidently was a hairless gray fox. That's the conclusion of Jaap Hillenius. He examined the carcass of a similar animal that had been hit by a car in the Charleston, S.C., area. So it wasn't an exotic cross-species, though some central North Carolina residents who spotted the animals had reported it having the head of a cat and the body of a canine. Just a fox sans hair because of a mutant gene, said Hillenius, associate professor in the biology department at College of Charleston. "That's the best we can...