Don't look for claw marks when finding cat tracks

on January 20, 2013 at 5:23 AM, updated January 20, 2013 at 5:24 AM

The morning I wrote this column there was a small amount of snow and ice on the deck and in the yard, and it was still precipitating. I couldn't tell if it was raining, sleeting, or doing both but I was grateful that I didn't have to go out and find out. But this is normal for January, much more normal than having a moth on the warm kitchen window the night before the wintry mix or having snowdrops blooming in the front yard weeks before they should be.

There was enough of a crust on the ice that when Rags the cat walked across it she left no marks. But there will be plenty of her prints later when the ice melts and the snow is exposed.

Cat tracks are pretty easy to identify. Cats keep their claws retracted when walking or running so their tracks show no claw marks like dog tracks do. They also have a large footpad in relation to their toes, which are arranged in a curved row. Bear in mind, though, that how fast an animal is moving and the condition of the ground can make any kind of track look different than it should be.

I've always wanted to find bobcat tracks on our property but that hasn't yet happened. I have, though, both heard and seen them elsewhere in the state. However, I know two very nature-knowledgeable people who have encountered this large but relatively docile long-legged and short-tailed wild cat near our place in spite of the fact that bobcats prefer more remote, more forested, and rockier areas.

Recently a friend of David's named John had an encounter with a bobcat while hunting across the river in New Jersey somewhere near Route 46. He was sitting still and quiet when a bobcat appeared, walked by him, and then disappeared into nearby brush. So he made a squeaking sound imitating, or so he said, a mouse and the bobcat came back out into view before once again walking away.

The white ground this morning was mirrored by the white of snow geese passing overhead in the sky. These winter visitors move around a lot during each day, sometimes going hundreds of miles farther south and sometimes going farther north. But they won't go back to the Arctic to breed until late March into early April.

Birders have a lot of interest in geese flocks at this time of the year because now is when unusual species from far off places like Greenland temporarily show up. Locally there's been both a pink-footed goose and a greater white-fronted goose in Allentown and a barnacle goose in Bucks County. All three species have also been found recently in New Jersey.

These rare geese are usually in with huge flocks of Canada (not Canadian) geese, which can mean spending hours in freezing weather looking through a scope at thousands of geese to find the odd one. And it's at times like that when I wonder why I do it.

Arlene Koch can be reached at