Animal Tracks and Hunter Signs. Ernest Thompson Seton
years before man appeared on this planet.
The ideal time for tracking, and almost the only time for most folk, is when the ground is white. After the first snow the student walks forth and begins at once to realize the wonders of the trail. A score of creatures whose existence, maybe, he did not know of are now revealed all about him, and the reading of their life histories becomes easy.
Whitetail Deer tracks
It is when the snow is on the ground, indeed, that we take the census of the woods. How often we learn with surprise from the telltale white that a Fox was around our hen house last night, that a Mink is living even now under the woodpile, or that a Deer—yes! there is no mistaking its sharp-pointed unsheeplike footprint—has wandered into our woods from the farther wilds!
Never lose the chance of the first snow if you wish to become a trailer. Nevertheless, remember that the first morning after a night snowfall is not so good as the second, for most wild creatures “hole up” during the storm; the snow hides the tracks of those that do go forth; and some actually go into a “cold sleep” for a day or two after a heavy downfall accompanied by severe frost. But a calm, mild night following a storm is sure to offer abundant and ideal opportunity for beginning the study of the trail.
It is a most fascinating amusement to learn some creature’s way of life by following its fresh track for hours in good snow. I never miss such a chance. If I cannot find a fresh track, I take a stale one, knowing that, theoretically, it is fresher at every step, and, from practical experience, that it always eventually brings one to some track that is fresh.
Although so much is to be read in the wintry white, we cannot at that time make a full account of all the woodland fourfoots, for there are some kinds that do not come out in the snow; they sleep more or less all winter.
Deer in action
Thus, one rarely sees the track of Chipmunk or Woodchuck in truly winter weather; and never, so far as I know, have the trails of Jumping Mouse or Mud Turtle been seen in the snow. These we can track only in the mud or dust.
Such tracks cannot be followed as far as those in snow, simply because the mud or dust does not cover the whole country; but they are often as clear and in some respects more easy of record.
Here are some of the important facts to keep in view when you set forth to master the rudiments of trailing, or “spooring,” as our English friends call it.
FIRST: No two animals leave the same trail; not only each kind but each individual at each stage of its life leaves a trail as distinctive as the creature’s appearance. It is obvious that they differ among themselves just as do we, because the young know their mothers, the mothers know their young, and the old ones know their mates, even when scent is clearly out of the question.
SECOND: The trail in its entirety was begun at the birthplace of that creature, and ends only at its death. It may be recorded in visible track or perceptible odor. It may last but a few hours and may be too faint even for an expert with present equipment to follow. But evidently the trail is made, wherever the creature journeys afoot.
THIRD: It varies with every important change of impulse, action, and emotion.
FOURTH: When we find a trail we may rest assured that, if living, the creature that made it is at the other end; and if one can follow, it is only a question of time before coming up with that animal. But be sure of its direction before setting out; many a novice has lost time by going backward on the trail.
Tracks on the farm
A practical trailer can, of course, tell something of the trail’s age by careful study. This finesse, however, is usually beyond the power of the beginner.
FIFTH: In studying trails, one must always keep probabilities in mind. Sometimes one kind of track looks much like another; then the question is, which is the likeliest in this place?
If I saw a Jaguar track in India, I should know it was made by a Leopard. If I found a Leopard trail in Colorado, I should be sure I had found the mark of a Cougar or Mountain Lion. A Wolf track on Broadway would doubtless be the work of a very large Dog; and a Saint Bernard’s footmark in the Rockies, twenty miles from anywhere, would most likely turn out to be the happen-so imprint of a Gray Wolf’s foot. To be sure of the marks, then, one should know all the animals that belong to the neighborhood.
The last letter I had from good old Dan Beard contained the photo of a track in the snow that he recently found under his bedroom window at Suffern, New York. He asked me to identify it for him.
The track was catlike in type, but too big for a House Cat. Therefore, it was either a Lynx or a Bobcat sign. It was not clear enough to show the exact style of the creature’s foot; but locality settled it. Bobcats are the usual kind of Lynx in southern New York; the Canada Lynx is now unknown in the region. So we concluded that the geographical placement definitely decided it to be a Bobcat or Bay Lynx that had peered by night into Uncle Dan’s window as he lay calmly asleep.
There is yet another feature of trail study that gives it exceptional value: it is an account of the creature pursuing its everyday life. If you succeed in getting a glimpse of a Fox or a Hare in the woods, the chances are a hundred to one that it was aware of your presence first. Animals are much cleverer than are we at this sort of thing; and if they do not actually sight or scent you, they observe, and are warned by, the actions of some other creatures that did sense you, and so cease their occupations to steal away or hide.
Mountain Lion tracks
But the snow story will tell of the life that the animal ordinarily leads—its method of searching for food, its kinds of food, the help it gets from its friends, or sometimes from its rivals; and thus offers an insight into its home life that is scarcely to be attained in any other way. The trailer has the key to a new storehouse of nature’s secrets, another of the Sibylline Books is opened to his view; his fairy godmother has, indeed, conferred on him a wonderful gift in opening his eyes to the footwriting of the trail. It is like giving sight to the blind man, like the rolling away of fogs from a mountain view; and the trailer comes closer than do others to the heart of the ancient woods.
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