By Kelly Alwood, Pipe Hitters Tactical
Most of us have learned what we know about the outdoors and tracking from our Dads or friends, who learned it from their Dad’s or friends, or picked up a trick or piece of knowledge somewhere along our trail of experience. Though this can be greatly beneficial at times, tracking like any other skill set, is best learned from a formal course setting. Tracking is the art of looking, finding, interpreting, and following. There are many parts to tracking. Finding and following the tracks is only a piece of it. Other pieces include scat, (that’s poop) identification, sign tracking, and animal behavior, track patterns, and track aging.
Scat identification can be of great importance to us in the woods. From the scat of an animal, we can tell the diet, general health, awareness level and travel patterns. If we break these down a bit you will see how they can help us. We can look at the scat of an animal and determine what it is eating, then we would have a better understanding of what bait we need to use to trap it, what kind of food is in the area for our consumption, and where that source of food might be. For example, we see a coyote run and identify the scat as such. We study and find that the coyote has been eating berries. We now know that there are berries in the area, not more than three feet off the ground, and that small game may be scarce as he is eating fruit vs. protein. This bit of information also tells us the general health of the coyote. It may not be running its usual 30-40 mile range if only functioning off berries. His territorial hunting may be quite smaller now till he starts to pick up more protein for energy. That can tell us that our chances of catching a rabbit for food may be slim in this area. As we are examining the scat, we also look to the tracks next to it. We will see from this a glimpse of the animal’s awareness level. When we see that he is very alert and aware even while he is pooping, then we know he is on his game and it will take great attention to detail and preparation to catch or hunt him. The scat is also a marker for a dominant animal. All dominant animals will "mark" their territory with scat. They will also urinate as well sometimes, but scat is the most dominant way to mark. This can tell us that more of that animal are in the area as well. They may be fighting for land, and competing for diet.
Sign tracking is a large part of your overall tracking skills. Sign tracking is finding any sign of an animal’s presence. This includes a host of signs or clues left behind as evidence of the animals passing. Some of these include, hair, leaf rock web disturbances, carcasses, chewed gnawed vegetation, beds and lays, rubs, scratching, broken twigs, and so on. Basically, everything else sign wise, except the footprint.
For instance, if you were to find a partial eaten rabbit carcass in the woods, you could know by how it was eaten what animal was eating it. Even after the snow melts, or his tracks are eroded away, the carcass will tell. the way vegetation is chewed and gnawed will tell you what animal is eating that plant. The fir left behind on a twig, branch, or fence will tell you what has been there and the path they take, and its size. The fir recognition takes a lot of practice. animals like deer, have different colors and types of fir on different parts of their body . So whenever you get close to any animal or carcass, be sure to thoroughly look and memorize all the fir and where it is. The wilds are filled with spider webs, so a disturbance or absence of these would be a sign to us as to the passing of an animal. When you start to study this closely, you can determine what kind of animal it was. Beds and lays are another giveaway of the animal. All animals have a different bed or lay. Most often hair will be present in them as well. By paying close attention to the shape, material, location, and hair in the bed, you can determine what animal beds down there. Scratches are a way of marking for animals. Many animals do this. Dogs, cats, deer, and most every animal in the wild will scratch. Some, like dogs, will scratch to get to something, others like cats will scratch to leave a scent, and deer will scrape to shed the velvet off their antlers. Paying attention to these and learning what each animal scratch looks like will quickly let you know what has been there.
Animal behavior is our next set of clues. This is an important part of tracking, as it can help us to predict behavior. For instance, if I look at the tracks and determine the animal is left foot dominant, then I can use this with my knowledge of the animals behavior to help me track it down. I must know how a frightened deer will behave if I want to track it after a shot while hunting. Which way will it run? Which side of the fence will it go? Which direction will it ultimately be heading for escape? How far will it go? In general, what exactly is this animal going to do? This basic concept is what most hunters rely on every year to harvest a deer. You go out and look for signs of presence, and set an ambush. But after your ambush, and the shot is taken, now what will he do? Blood is another part of sign tracking. And you can now see how all of these are coming together to enhance our abilities in the woods. Learning to determine the extent of the injury from the blood is another useful skill. This will help predict immediate behavior, and length of the track.
Track patterns will help us make an immediate determination of our target animal and save us time. If you can look at a set of tracks in the snow for instance, from maybe 20 yards away and determine whether it is the animal you are looking for or not, this will save you time. Animal track patterns vary by species, and sometimes sub species. Example, dog, fox, cat, and deer are diagonal walkers. The track patterns are all the same. The size, shape, pitch, and so on may be different in the individual track, but the pattern is the same. Some animals are diagonal walkers, some bounders, some hoppers, some waddlers. By knowing and recognizing the patterns readily, we can quickly determine the tracks we wish to follow. This helps us make up time when tracking a wounded deer, and can even be done from a vehicle without having to get out and follow step by step.
Following footprints left behind becomes much easier after learning a few basics. Several disciplines must be involved. You must be able to see the tracks. This is the hardest part for most people. I’m not talking about seeing tracks in snow or mud; I’m talking about in the field, woods, and yard. We have a series of drills we have designed to help new trackers start seeing tracks. Once you can see them everywhere, you must branch out and be well rounded. You need to learn to see them in short grass, leaves, debris, woods, pine needles, and even the dark. Many times folks end up tracking our deer in the dark, yet no one ever goes out and practices this skill. Learn what kind of lighting is needed, learn how shadows work, and learn what kind of light you need for blood and the angles you need. When you get to the level that you can see tracks in all environments, then you can start dissecting the tracks and pull more behavior detail from them. An example would be, you are tracking a deer and you lose the trail. It just ends. You can’t find the next track. Well if you know how to read the details out of the individual tracks, then it will tell you where the next track is. The clue is always in the last track. You can look at the track and determine whether it is male or female. Scared, pregnant, what it was looking at, many things can be told from a single track.
Track aging is another useful tool for us. If we were out scouting for a place to hunt or trap, and came across tracks matching our quarry, we need to be able to know how fresh they are. Or, how many times have you been tracking a deer, only for your deer to run through a path used by many deer. Then they split. How do you know which one is your deer? Track aging plays an important role in collecting track data. This is another part that just plain takes a lot of practice. We have developed a system to help learn how tracks age. Just think of how useful this could be if you could actually tell the age of the track, and even sign. Putting all of these parts together gives us a full view and understanding of the landscape around us, and how our quarry works.
So you can see how all of the tracking skills are coming together to give us more ability and speed. By seeing blood, track pattern, brush disturbance, and the animals behavior, we can quickly track down our wounded deer. Know where and what to set our traps for. Know what is in my woods that is eating or scaring away my pheasant. Even know why my honey bees left, and so on. By learning how to track, proficiently, we can determine exactly what is going on in the places we love to spend our time.
Hope to see you in the woods, Kelly Alwood
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