The kids have been doing remote classes all year. In order to break up the monotony their science teacher assigned some outdoor homework. They had to find and identify critter tracks in the snow. It sounded like a lot of fun so I joined the kids and brought along the camera. We traveled all around the Woodpile and down to the pond. I was surprised by just how many tracks there were. I had never really paid much attention before.
We found hundreds of birds tracks – Juncos, sparrow, blue jays and many more.
The kids spotted Bushy the squirrel’s tracks as he raced around the Woodpile trying to remember where he buried all his acorns.
Everyone was excited when we found tracks from the Easter Bunny who was scouting out the best routes for delivering baskets of goodies in advance.
We got really nervous when we found fox tracks leading right up to Mom’s porch. Mom came out and said she was okay, the fox wanted directions to Florida, he was tired of the freezing cold weather.
Then we almost fell into these gigantic tracks. We couldn’t find them in our field guide to animal tracks. Chippy Jr. dug out of his backpack his trusty guide to dinosaurs. According to the book it was a Velociraptor. All this time I thought the Jurassic Park movies were science fiction. I didn’t realize they were documentary films!
With great trepidation we started to follow the tracks. A short time later we ran into the science teacher. She was so excited about the tracks and started an impromptu lesson on the life history of wild turkeys. We listened intently, smiled, and never mentioned we thought they were dinosaur tracks. At least I can sleep tonight.
On the way back to the burrow for a well earned cup of homemade hot chocolate with marshmallow fluff, we discovered these really fresh tracks.
Each one of these tracks was over two feet long! This was no turkey. Before, I could stop the kids they scurried along to see where the tracks went to.
The next thing I know they come flying back at warp speed. As they flew by they yelled, “It 's an abominable snowman, run for your lives!”
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