Things I have Learned While Walking the Dogs
- Mobs of red-polls show up like bus loads of school children on the first sunny days of March and turn the fresh snow into elephant skin quilt patchworks. Their trails loop around like a grade-schoolers cursive writing and abstract artworks. They move on in a noisy ruckus as suddenly as they descend.
- Ravens can leave tracks in the snow that at first glance can resemble a moose trail if the snow conditions are right.
- Red-polls seem to eat birch seeds off the snow surface during the mid day sun but seem to switch to spruce nuts as dusk settles in with its long shadows. Do they get more energy from the nuts to last them the cold nights?
- The black-capped chickadees begin whistling out their territories shortly after the red-polls gangs begin to break into smaller groups and pairs. Love is in the air.
- My male lab's footprints have two large,closely spaced central toes flanked by two smaller,angled side toe prints. His rear feet leave a slim linear drag mark in powdery snow, behind the main print, offset to the same side as the foot that made it. My female labs prints are a bit smaller and her hind prints trailing drag mark is more flattened. Of course all this varies according to the snow conditions and gait.
- The artistic looping trails left by the red-poll mobs all but disappear on the snow surface within four days of sunshine. They melt away into the surface even quicker if they lie in an extra sunny spot.
- Red squirrels tracks in fluffy snow look like they leap across it in a flying superman pose. Their tracks are larger than those of voles and shrews but can be most easily distinguished by the fact that their trails lead from tree to tree.
- There is at least one bull moose, a cow with twins and another with one calf frequenting my neighborhood. The bull had only a single antler two weeks ago but also dropped that one by the time I saw him again.
- There is a fox living across the river from Island Homes.
- People on foot are friendlier than those on snow machines or in cars. However even people in cars are generally very friendly when I'm on foot. Actually people in Fairbanks seem to be very friendly in general, especially if greeted with a smile and a nod.
