Like learning to read a story in a book, the trick to reading the stories of critters' lives is to learn the track alphabet. Tracks—animal footprints—are most easily found on malleable surfaces such as mud, sand, or snow.
Indeed, the snowy winter, naturalists agree, is the best time of year for budding trackers to begin their forays. With paw prints so easily left on the snow surface, a novice can walk into the yard and find tracks immediately, Wisniewski said.
"But tracking isn't limited to winter months," he said. "There are tracks and signs that are there all the time … and as you learn to read them, you'll find they are always there."
Any number of local field guides can help teach the alphabet of tracks—what critter made what track, how fast or slow it was moving, and even the time of day the track was made. Naturalists say a good teacher or mentor and practice, practice, practice are the keys to learning the tracking ABCs.
Once the alphabet is learned, the backyard is suddenly full of words, Mitchell said. And for trackers who spend a great deal of time in a single place, they can even learn who the players are and weave elaborate novels.
Growing Interest
According to Mitchell, tracking has become a popular pastime. The number of naturalists offering introductory courses in his region of Massachusetts has increased at least fivefold in the past 20 years.
"It is wonderful," he said. "A regular suburbanite can sign on with a tracker, and they don't have to go very far out of the suburbs to find all sorts of wildlife."
Moon, with the Wilderness Awareness School, has also noticed a growing interest in tracking over the last decade, with more than 200 students participating in tracking programs last year.
"We definitely have goals of getting it more and more into the attention of the mainstream," he said. "One area of growing attention is the science community, which is increasingly recognizing tracking as a viable scientific tool in which to find out what animals exist in an area."
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