[Gutenberg 45578] • Tracks and Tracking

TO derive the greatest pleasure from the pursuit of game, either large or small, it is necessary that the disciple of Nimrod be versed in the science of interpreting the meaning of tracks and trails. Nature is as an open book to the man who can read the signs of the woods and plains correctly; and where the uninitiated see only meaningless tracks, experienced hunters find them in many instances the guide to exhilarating sport and a desired trophy. To the tyro the finest tracking snow is useless and the marks he sees everywhere around him simply bewilder him. Were he able to read them as every hunter should, his day's sport would mean enjoyment and success, instead of disappointment and failure.

Game is not so plentiful as it used to be, and for this reason it is generally a waste of time—from the standpoint of the game bag—merely to tramp through the woods and trust to luck. Moreover, the high-power, small-caliber rifles, which are so extensively used, very often lead to shots at distances at which it is not possible to place an immediately fatal bullet. This makes it the more necessary for the hunter to be able to read the signs correctly and to interpret aright the language of the trails. Every sportsman should consider it a sacred duty to bring to bay any animal he has wounded, and he should also regard it a matter of honor to acquire a working knowledge of tracks, trails, and signs. Then he will not, through ignorance, make carrion or wolf-bait of a noble creature which, in all reason, he should have secured.

A sportsman who is unable to interpret the meaning of tracks he encounters, however much game he may have killed by chance, luck, or with the assistance of others, will be considered a tyro in woodcraft by companions who have learned their lessons in this art.

Lack of opportunity on the part of the majority of sportsmen to become versed in tracking lore by actual experience, as well as the incompetence of a great number of guides, is the reason for this book. The contents represent the experience gained from twenty years of uninterrupted life in the great outdoors; and while only half of that time was spent in the pursuit and study of American game, the foreign experience was a considerable aid in arriving at definite conclusions, for the same species, with but few exceptions, show the same features in their trails the world over.

No space has been given to microscopic intricacies, since in the woods plain tracking lore is intricate enough. In practice whoever looks for exaggerated, fine, distinctive features in tracks and trails soon sees things which a sober-minded expert recognizes as imaginative.

GENERAL REMARKS

About the Motive Features of Different Animals

TAKING it for granted that the arrangement of the individual tracks in the trail is due to the general anatomic make-up of the animal which made them, we have to consider four groups in the treatise on mammals.

The first, the members of which possess a length of body correctly proportional to their height, includes the deer, ox, bear, dog, and cat families.

The second includes rabbits, squirrels, and animals whose hind legs are very long in proportion to their front legs.

The third is made up of those animals whose legs, considering the length of their bodies, are very short—marten, mink, etc.

The fourth group embraces the animals whose legs are very short in proportion to the length of the body, and whose bodies, in addition to this, are disproportionately thick—beaver, badger, etc.

CONTENTS

Hoofed Game

The White-Tailed or Virginia Deer

The Fan-Tailed Deer

The Mule Deer

The Wapiti or Elk

The Moose

The Mountain Sheep

The Antelope

Predaceous Animals:

The Bear

The Cougar

The Lynx

The Domesti