Snowshoe excursion: Tracks tell wildlife tales

For Brian Baxter, tracking winter wildlife requires sharp senses, a deep understanding of ecology and a detective’s acumen.

Ten nature hunters turned out for his winter ecology nature walk near Kalispell last Saturday, armed with snowshoes and curiosity.

The group met for a short classroom session at the Kalispell Montessori Center, where Baxter explained how the word “ecology” relates to its Greek root “oikos,” meaning “house.”

“When we’re looking at winter ecology, we’re looking at the house, or home, in which organisms are connected to their winter environment,” Baxter explained. “You’re looking at their core range, where they hang out and find sustenance, nesting and protection.”

Baxter described a range of strategies for tracking wildlife that he honed over his years of experience as a forester, trapper and environmental educator. He focused on the need to understand the animals’ adaptations to successfully read the clues scattered around their environment.

“If you’re out here in early September, late October, you want to keep an eye on those lone, large trees and cotton-wood snags,” Baxter explained. “We’ll hunt there, because that’s where you’ll find animals using the trees for shelter and the birds that prey on them.”

He added that horizontal holes drilled in birch and aspen are a sign that a bird called a Williamson’s sapsucker may be near, having created a trap for insects by releasing the sweet, sticky sap from the trees.

Leading the group through the snow-covered woods in the Owen Sowerwine Natural Area, Baxter challenged participants to pick out the tracks of snowshoe hares, pine squirrels and white-tailed deer. Walking toward a young lodgepole pine, he stopped to examine a buck rub.

“You’ll find a lot of hairs in conifers, which can tell you what type of deer this was. The sap traps the hair against the tree.”

Hiking along the frozen banks of the Flathead and Stillwater rivers, Baxter gave a sudden cry that sent a ripple of enthusiasm through the rest of the group, which left its lunch spot to carefully file along the crumbling ice to the water’s edge.

“This is what I’ve been looking for,” Baxter said with a smile, pointing to a collection of cryptic markings in the snow and ice. “There’s the tracks, two or three [otters], and that’s where they perched, turned around, like they weren’t sure if they were going to head that way, and slid down the snow here into the water.”

The class gathered around, peering down at the snow to discern the smaller thumbprint and the four other toes outlined in each pawprint. And while the six-hour walk clearly had a few attendees ready to return to the meet-up spot, people felt they had come away with valuable insights.

“I wanted to do this after hearing so many stories from our daughter,” explained Jaime Caltabiano of Whitefish. “She goes hiking and mountain climbing all the time, and she’d come back with all these great stories of all the wildlife she saw. I’m not a mountain climber, so this is a little better pace for me.”

The group stopped to offer theories over a convergence of deer tracks at the shore of a frozen estuary where a young cottonwood had fallen down onto the ice. The winning suggestion was that the tree’s fall had provided an opportunity for foraging, with the deer gathering to munch the otherwise-inaccessible buds and younger shoots from the higher branches.

On the way back, Baxter left the class walking above the bank while he hunted for one last time at the water’s edge. The reward was a long line of tracks leading to the river, from which he sketched out the narrative of a mink attacking a duck and eating it on the shore.

Baxter hosts monthly wildlife walks in partnership with the Montana Wilderness Association and the Glacier Institute. 

His next outing, focused on animal tracking and sign interpretation, is Feb. 21 beginning at 9 a.m. The group will meet at the Kila Pub at 4220 U.S. 2 in Kila for a short indoor session followed by a hike around Smith Lake. 

To register for this class or other walks, visit www.wildmontana.org/our-work/programs/wilderness-walks.

Reporter Samuel Wilson may be reached at 758-4407 or by email at swilson@dailyinterlake.com.