Rabbit and Rat in Snow

Across frozen kettleholes, a lot rat activity, and eastern cottontail.  The cottontail is heading right, and the rat is heading left. 

 

 

Grey Squirrel Scat

This crusty frozen snow surface has made it possible to identify without doubt grey squirrel scat.  My back yard is full of the stuff.   A great setting for finding hairs too, as is shown in the journal page.

 

 

Grey Squirrel Mushroom Sign

Squirrels love mushrooms.  I was lucky enough to catch sight of this one going mad in the mushroom candy store of our back yard.  Why do they never eat the whole thing?  Here's a good video of a squirrel eating a mushroom it appears to have cached under a log. Or the videographer cached it.

Note clear incisor marks on lower right.

It left this one attached to its stem, in the ground, and just took a pizza slice out of it, as well as gnawing the edge.

Red Fox Puzzle in Slick Mud

 

There are a lot of puncture marks here, some of which don't belong with this particular pair of feet.  Can you find the toes that go with the nails?  Can you find the heel pads?  Notice how far ahead of the toe the nails hit the mud.

 

This is the complete photo

I call these a front and rear because the upper track is much larger than the lower.  If you look very carefully you will find another track on the left, showing two clear nails, and one clear toe.

Chipmunk in the mud

Beautiful little chipmunk pattern in what must have been very squishy mud.  Fronts to the right



Fronts at bottom

 Gorgeous day on the powerline.  A rare find of a trail of chipmunk tracks. Their narrow trail width is only 2 1/4", even in this wet substrate.  4 toes in front, 5 on the rears. 

As a bonus, many of the spring flowers are out; goat's-rue, mountain laurel, (a pink variety), berries ripening on the huckleberry.  Young redtails, looking huge as eagles, whining from the towers, waiting to be fed.  Turkeys and flickers gorging on ants in the sandy road.  A glossy black racer, tasting the air as I passed.  Towhees sneaking around in the scrubby bear oak.


Racemed Milkwort  polygala polygama

Opossum Tracks

 

Opossum tracks don't get much better than this.  Especially the left rear.  Possum patterns are one of those where when I see a total mess, I start looking for possum characteristics. Speaking of which, "possums" live in Australia, and "opossums" live in the western hemisphere. (according to grammarist.com)

Left rear; note the beautiful musculature of the "palm" and the opposable "thumb".



Right front partially covered by right rear, in the opossum's typical understep walk.

 




Killdeer Snackbar

At my favorite mud puddle, a recent arrival.   Killdeer leaving the most delicate, calligraphic lines of tracks, in mud fine as clay slip.  Great tracking!

Killdeer tracks  1 1/8" long  the blunt toe to the rear of tack is another bird.
 

Note webbing between toes 3 and 4, and absence of rear toe.