A Solitary Walker: Winter tracks in snow and mud

Some years ago, while skiing across a nearby snowy hayfield with two little brown dogs leading the way, I noticed beneath my skis, the snow patterns seemed to be leaning the wrong way — the windblown ridges and valleys were not acting like sand dunes on the shore. An investigation into what our local cold region scientists at CRREL had to say about snow bedforms led me to write my first piece for the Valley News as A Solitary Walker: “What the Sastrugi taught me — trust what you see.” Snow, as I learned, acts nothing like sand.

Five years later, still walking, skiing and writing, still traversing the snowy hayfields with the same little brown dogs, I am still learning. We’ve had some snow, not yet enough for skiing, but enough for seeing who has been by this way. We all leave a print behind and it says something about who we are.

My little dogs each leave distinctive tracks. The smallest one has a bum leg that she drags, leaving her nail mark in the snow. The bigger one runs faster — four prints in rows listing diagonally. Both are domestic canines, with food bowls at home and a well-trained human.

They have the surplus energy to meander around the field, stopping to sniff every interesting blade of grass or pile of poo. They show particular interest in the droppings of a fox. Its prints head straight as an arrow across the field. They say, “Don’t mess with me. I’m on a mission.” Fox and coyote don’t waste time meandering, they must find food and avoid predation.

One little rodent’s meandering tunnels in snow look like bark beetle designs in wood, curving here and there, doubling back to get a bite of grass, detouring over to the apple trees for a nibble of bark. The unloved meadow vole, who tears up the lawn and chews the fruit trees, leaves some of the most beautiful designs.

Thinking that winter had arrived I put a bird feeder up, then did a double take when a day later, I found instead of the feeder, a big pile of poo and toe prints from some enormous barefoot guy with only four toes. I followed his tracks to the river where the bird feeder lay on a large pile of brush clippings. The bear may have been curled up underneath, so I crept up, grabbed it, and ran back to the house.

Ruffed grouse lay peace-sign tracks, which usually end where the bird either burrowed into the snow for the night or where it erupted in flight, leaving behind wing marks. We came upon a line of grouse tracks that ended in a multitude of wing marks, so many of them, I thought there had been a struggle, yet I saw no drops of blood indicating a predator. Some mysteries are beyond me. Maybe a flock came together for a big hoopla and took off in one big confusion.

On Monday, a warm wind came through, melting the snow and bringing waves of rain from the south. The dogs and I hiked around the village in our rain gear watching the river rise onto the flood plains and over the low roads washing out what it now seems to wash out every few months. Our fields became lakes as they filled up, then slowly let go of the water, saving the village downstream. The next morning, we were out early looking at big dead trees scattered like pick-up-sticks along the banks. Looking down at silt deposits left behind and already tracked with tiny meadow vole prints, I saw that these alluvial patterns looked just like the sandy beach, with their highest peaks heading away from the flow. So, the river lays down silt just like the wind deposits sand, and neither one of them acts like snow.

Micki Colbeck, of Strafford, is a naturalist and writer and chair of the Strafford Conservation Commission. Write to her at mjcolbeck@gmail.com.