Coyote Trailin'

I've been having some wonderful full days of tracking lately. Spending so much time in nature makes me think about how many ties each organism has to everything else. The fact that one individual grass species is growing at the edge of a swamp means so many things. It speaks to the process of evolution, many years of competition forced that grass to adapt all of the necessary traits to live right there. It is tied to the soil, the climate of the area, the winds or animals necessary for seed dispersal. The lack of grazers or voles coming by to eat that blade of grass. The beavers that created the swamp which opened up sunlight and enriched the soil for that grass to grow. So many things are connected to that single clump of grass. Everything in nature is interacting and participating with everything else.

Tracking forces a person to acknowledge all of these connections and interactions. I find the way mammals shape a forest to be really cool. Squirrels dispersing acorns, moose browse altering which tree species grow where, moles aerating the soil, and so on. And then there's the way predators shape the territories of herbivores with their daily routes through the forest. And how birds and chipmunks report on all of this as its happening. Unfortunately most people don't get the joy of interacting with this incredibly complex and beautiful system. For me, tracking brings me into this system on a daily basis. I get to see many of these processes going on as well as my own impact on them. Survival treks bring a whole different level to the experience. Where tracking is fun, insightful and often profound, being in a survival situation closes the circle and makes me a total player in the system.

Yesterday we had some afternoon rain so when I went tracking in the evening, it was easy to tell the tracks that were REALLY fresh from the ones that weren't. I came across some really fresh coyote tracks and decided that I had to try and follow the trail. Trailing is very difficult but also exhilarating. After trailing an animal for even a short time I feel a real connection to that animal. Like it is a close friend and I can feel its hunger, the spring in its step, its fear of humans, etc. I was having a really fun time trailing this coyote for a couple hundred yards when the trail turned back on itself and headed into a thick brushy area. It was getting late so I decided to abandon the trail and go watch the sunset on a hill that looked over the entire area. Ten minutes later the coyote came trotting out of the brush and back along the trail that I had followed. It stopped every 20 feet or so and looked back over its shoulder like it thought it was being followed. I had a perfect view of where it was going and got to watch it trotting and loping along for several minutes. Another magical experience as a result of paying attention to the little things in nature.

The human world is so different compared to the natural world. Everything in nature has its place and makes sense. Everyone plays by the same rules and gets a fair chance at survival. When something dies, every cell gets used and is returned into the system. At some point we stepped out of that cycle and stopped following those natural laws that have worked so well for the past several billion years.