Animal Clues

JORDANELLE STATE PARK - Once the snow angels and snowball fights were out the way and the snowshoes were strapped on, the mission began. The rookie investigators, fresh from a special course, quickly came across their first clues.
    "Over here! Tracks," came the call.
    Moving as fast as their still-adjusting-to-snowshoes-feet could go without causing a tumble, a dozen children and their parents waddled to the nearest clump of brush.
    "Something was here," one child excitedly yelled, pointing at tracks covered with several inches of fresh snow.
    "It can sometimes be hard to identify old tracks, but let's take a look," said Jordanelle State Park naturalist Kathy Donnell. "Any guesses?"
    Rather than the expected cacophony of presumptions, the kids pulled out a cheat sheet and asked Donnell to pull out her tape measure.
    "What's the stride length?"
    "Is it a hopper, a bounder or a long-legged walker?"
    There were more questions than answers and Malone Sheeran, a 10-year-old from Oakley, was asking most of them.
    "That's how you learn things, by asking questions," Sheeran said.
    During the seven years that Donnell has been running the Track Me If You Can! program at the Rock Cliff Nature Center in Jordanelle State Park, she has learned that the one thing children do not run out of is questions.
    "It's fun to see the excitement they have when they find new tracks. They also like to look for poop. That's a big event when poop is discovered," Donnell said of the popular free - with park admission - program offered the first and third Saturdays from December through March at Rock Cliff. "It's mostly about them becoming more alert to the nature around them."
    For the Meza family of Marion, the Track Me If You Can! program offered a chance to learn more about their new state and more about that white stuff on the ground they didn't have at their old home in Houston.
    "My favorite part is putting on the snowshoes and walking on the snow," said 11-year-old Tori Meza. "The snow makes it a lot different."
    Hugo Meza brought his two oldest children to the see the wonder of winter in the woods.
    "We learned some really interesting things," he said. "There are a lot of things you take for granted. It's fun for me to explore these things with the girls."
    The Track Me If You Can! program starts with a 45-minute classroom lesson where Donnell explains the three tracking groups: hopper (like a rabbit), bounder (a weasel, for example) and long-legged walker (deer, etc.).
    Donnell also talks about how each of the animals deals with winter - whether they fly south, sleep it off or change their fur color.
    Then it comes time to strap on snowshoes and hit the snow. (Participants can bring their own or borrow one of the 30 pairs the nature center loans out.)
    Sometimes, like last Saturday, wildlife cooperate and leave fresh tracks, and sometimes a glimpse of themselves before melting into the forest.
    After investigating old and fresh tracks of short-tailed weasel - or ermine - the participants found the bedding area of four deer, which had bounded away in the distance.
    Donnell said deer tracks are the most common found during the walks. Rabbit and weasel tracks also show up frequently. Others include, muskrat, beaver, moose, bobcat and mountain lion.
    Sometimes the class is left to solve the case of small rodent tracks ending in a scene of blood, excrement and wide sweeping brushes in the show. Donnell likes to watch the faces of the children as they figure out that a hawk or owl had captured a meal in the spot.
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    * BRETT PRETTYMAN can be contacted at brettp@sltrib .com or 801-257-8902. Send comments about this story to livingeditor@sltrib.com.