There’s No Tracking Like Snow Tracking!

Welcome to winter in Minnesota!

While the snowstorms over the last four weeks have posed some challenges for urban snow plowing, they have created incredible conditions for tracking. Tracking through snow can be an utter delight or a real challenge, depending on the conditions and your aims — but it does capture movements of animals you might not see in the warmer seasons.

Deer trails crisscross the snowy, mostly frozen Minnesota River at Fort Snelling State Park

How I Started Tracking 

One of my core volunteer commitments is to the Minnesota Wildlife Tracking Project. I’ve been coming to the MWTP Tracking Club since it began in October 2013, nearly 10 years ago.

Back then, I didn’t know what a deer track looked like. But after just three hours, I was in awe of what we found that day, what was possible to know from listening to the landscape, and how tracking could create good community with one other. I was hooked.

Over nine years later, I host our monthly Trailing Practice, help facilitate monthly Tracking Club programs, and coordinate annual trailing programs with a visiting teacher (Dr. Kersey Lawrence of Original Wisdom). It’s been a fantastic journey, and I’m profoundly grateful for the MWTP community.

Snow Tracking at Fort Snelling State Park

At our January Tracking Club, we explored the paths of Fort Snelling State Park. Over our three hours of wandering towards Pike Island, we witnessed:

• Cottontail feeding sign on river grape vines
• Fresh deer trails… and the deer who left them, bedded down in the snow
• Fresh coyote scat in the middle of the bike/ski trail
• Clumps of cottontail fur… and what might have been stomach and caecum contents
• Deer trails crisscrossing the (mostly) frozen Minnesota River
• Passerine (small bird) tracks underneath seed heads on the riverbank
• An opossum walking across the path… and its clear, fresh trail leading underneath a snow-covered brush pile

The fresh walking trail of our opossum.

Stories in the Snow

A passerine trail walks towards the camera through dead stalks. The last tracks show more disturbance or energy of the animal, indicating the bird may have taken wing.

Each one of these tracks or signs tells a story about an animal interacting with the landscape. Each spoor invites more curiosity and questions:

• Who was this?
• Why were they here?
• When were they here?
• What were they doing?
• What are they eating now?
• Are they still here now?

It’s one of the best ways I can imagine to spend a weekend morning: immersing in my senses, following my curiosity, and sharing with a bunch of other folks.

There’s No Tracking Like Snow Tracking! 

Rough incisor marks and elliptical scats point to a cottontail browsing on this grapevine.

If you’re curious about snow tracking, I recently gave a talk to the Minnesota Rovers: “There’s No Tracking Like Snow Tracking!” During that hour, I reviewed how to distinguish kinds of tracks we might see in the urban snow, and I shared the story of trailing a bobcat at a November 2022 workshop in Cable, WI.

If you’d like a taste of what MWTP Tracking Club or my tracking programs are like, get yourself a cup of tea, pull up a chair, click here and enjoy.

Want to Share that Track or Scat? 

The overhead view of these small bird tracks with clear scale lets us measure them accurately.

If you find a track or scat on your next winter walk that you’d like me to identify, don’t be shy!

• Take an overhead picture of the track or spoor (including a standard scale, like a quarter or dollar bill).
• Take a picture of the trail (4+ tracks if possible).
• Take a picture of the surroundings, to give a sense of habitat.
• Email your pictures to naturalawarenessguide@gmail.com.

I’d be delighted to see what you’re seeing, hear your questions, and walk through track & sign identification with you.

Here’s an example of a well-documented scat in photographs: