I enjoy walking in the woods -- some might tell you I get a huge kick out of walking rapidly up and down the steep paths among the trees, the activity representing a jolt of energy and motion during a mostly sedentary day.
There are many forms of wildlife to observe during these walks, from the hawks riding the thermal currents, looking for their next meal, to the deer which scamper away at your approach, as do the wild turkeys, the rabbits, the groundhogs, the squirrels and the chipmunks.
During winter, the woods are much quieter than in other seasons, the cold causing the animals to restrict their activities and the snow muffling whatever sounds might exist. As my boots crunch in the snow, I find myself searching for signs of life during my winter walks. I seem to focus on the prints the various critters leave in the snow. These are, of course, among the most temporary of the visible marks these organisms can leave in their wake and this may very well be the reason I find them so interesting.
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| Human tracks intersect with Wild Turkey tracks on a path in the woods. The size of their prints gives an idea of the physical size of these birds. |
What about the marks
I leave behind, you might ask. Human footprints in the snow, which can be filled-in by the next snowfall, or erased when the temperature warms-up, represent the transient signs the human lifeforms leave behind as they traverse through the woods. While they do temporarily alter the landscape, at least they don't represent any long-term changes to the environment, like the trash the careless might toss away.
On January 31, I snapped the picture shown here.
The walking trails through the woods are regularly cleared of the snow by the maintenance crews, so that they remain relatively easy to navigate, even when we receive massive snowfalls.
The sun had come out and the temperature had briefly warmed above freezing that day, which had caused the thin layer of uncleared snow to melt off the dark-colored path. Curiously, there were some footprints which remained however -- what caused this phenomenon?
"Elementary my dear Watson", Mr. Holmes would say in explanation.
The weight of a person compresses the snow and causes it to temporarily melt. Of course the thin layer of water in the footprint is surrounded by the colder snow, so it rapidly re-freezes, turning into ice.
When the weather warms-up, the snow melts faster than the ice. Thus the untouched snow on the path melts first, while the icy marks left behind by the few humans who wandered this way linger-on for a while longer, before they too are erased.
