Wildlife Window: Snow tells tales of wildlife in the area

Before newspapers and magazines, before telephones and internet, snow handled all the gossip about local activities.

Birds and mammals moving about areas covered with fresh snow leave information behind. Prints in snow can identify the animal that made them, but they can also reveal the animal’s direction of travel as well as its overall behavior.

A long sequence of prints indicates the animal was just traveling from here to there. By contrast prints that form a curving or zig-zagging trail indicate the animal was searching for something, probably food.

A sequence of prints that end at a hole in the snow only to appear a short distance away indicates some animal was burrowing into and beneath the snow. Long-tailed weasels do this in their pursuit of mice and voles they can hear beneath