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{span}Todd Hawkins\u2019 gray fox photo selected as the featured image for the 2027 Ohio Wildlife Legacy Stamp. All stamp proceeds go to wildlife conservation, with most benefiting species of greatest conservation need through the Wildlife Diversity Fund.{\/span}<\/p>\n
Contributed<\/p>\n
Contributed<\/p>\n
A Washington County photographer\u2019s image of one of Ohio\u2019s more agile woodland predators will be featured on the state\u2019s 2027 Wildlife Legacy Stamp.<\/p>\n
Todd Hawkins of Marietta won the 18th annual Ohio Wildlife Legacy Stamp photo contest with his photograph of a gray fox. The Ohio Department of Natural Resources Division of Wildlife selected the image from 99 entries.<\/p>\n
The contest\u2019s theme this year was mammals, and photographs were judged on originality, composition, technical excellence and overall beauty. Diana Yatson of Strongsville placed second with a photograph of a pair of river otters, while Troy Nemitz of Milan took third with an image of a red fox.<\/p>\n
Gray foxes are found in forested areas of Ohio and have salt-and-pepper-colored coats. Unlike red foxes, which have white-tipped tails, gray foxes have distinctive black tips on their tails.<\/p>\n
They also have an unusual ability among foxes: They can climb trees. Their diet includes small mammals, insects, birds, eggs, fruits and nuts.<\/p>\n
The 2027 Ohio Wildlife Legacy Stamp featuring Hawkins\u2019 photograph will go on sale March 1. The stamp costs $15 and includes a commemorative card. Each year, a different Ohio wildlife species is featured.<\/p>\n
Proceeds benefit wildlife conservation, with most of the money going to species of greatest conservation need through the Wildlife Diversity Fund. The fund supports habitat restoration, wildlife and habitat research, educational materials and efforts to restore and conserve endangered and threatened species.<\/p>\n
One dollar from every stamp sold also goes to the Southern Wings program, which protects wintering habitat for Neotropical migratory birds that pass through Ohio.<\/p>\n
The 2026 Wildlife Legacy Stamp, featuring a killdeer, remains available through Ohio\u2019s Wildlife Licensing System, businesses that sell hunting and fishing licenses and the HuntFish OH mobile app.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"{span}Todd Hawkins\u2019 gray fox photo selected as the featured image for the 2027 Ohio Wildlife Legacy Stamp. All…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":885817,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[79,201],"class_list":["post-885816","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-science","tag-wildlife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/885816","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=885816"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/885816\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/885817"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=885816"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=885816"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=885816"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}