Date: Sunday, Sept 1, 2024

Place: south end of Guelph, ON (Kortright Rd, near Gordon St.), and further south.

Time: 3 – 4:40 pm

Main references:

‘The Tracker’s Field Guide: A Comprehensive Manual for Animal Tracking’, James C. Lowery, Second Edit., Falcon Guide

‘Bird Tracks & Sign: A Guide to North American Species’, Mark Elbroch and Eleanor Marks, First Edit., Stackpole Books

‘Mammal Tracks & Sign: A Guide to North American Species’, Mark Elbroch and Eleanor Marks, First Edit., Stackpole Books

Weather: partly cloudy. We had heavy rain 2 days earlier.

Discussion: The tracking site is in a suburban area of Guelph in the South End, with ongoing development for new housing. I also road my bike to investigate some newer housing developments in the South End in an attempt to find the source of some wetlands. There has been a vast amount of new housing built in recent years and the wild areas have been decimated.

I started by taking my bike over a fence into an area that is currently being developed. The photo below is a path that I looked at first for tracks:

Deer tracks were everywhere:

In the last few tracks you can see how the substrate was pushed up and distorted. In one photo you can see some substrate flung ahead of the track. I remembered that we had heavy rain two days ago, so I think these pressure releases were made in mud. So the tracks are at most two days old.

I then walked to another area close by where dirt is being removed from a huge mound:

I found some house cat tracks:

I noticed several things. Have a look at the first photo. I can’t recall if this is a front or a hind foot (apparently the hind tracks are smaller than the front tracks). Edit (thanks Alexis): looking at the 1st photo I think this is a left foot. By analogy with our hand, ignoring the thumb!, toe 2 is slightly ahead of the others. Furthermore, the line of symmetry through the track is angles slightly inwards (angle a little less than 90 degrees). Also in photo 5, it looks like the bottom track is a right and the top track a left (because of the leading 2nd toes). In the second photo we see an indirect register (under-step). Apparently (Lowery) an indirect register is most common. The final photo is interesting. The pattern of tracks does not seem to be any particular gait. Did the cat just land from a jump and stop? Or is this where it was before jumping?

Interspersed with the cat tracks were Cottontail tracks, see below:

In some of them you can see a fair degree of detail in the tracks, but in the others it is only the front of the track that shows as a point, or even just the claw marks. I wonder if the cat was attracted by the Cottontail? Finally, because of some very fine silt/mud from semi-dried puddles there were some nice bird tracks:

The bird has anisodactyl feet (the most common), where toe 1 points backward and toes 2, 3 and 4 point forward. I think these might be Robin tracks because: the size is approximately right, there are skips and walks, and the toe pads have a distinctive bulbous appearance.

I then decided to investigate further south and try and find the source of some marshy areas. The building of houses is unrelenting. Alexis has asked me to (in addition to scientific reporting) pay attention to what my feelings are telling me while tracking. Well seeing the devastation to the wild areas of Guelph left me with a deep sense of loss and sadness. It seems the only places that were not developed (or under development) are the wetland areas, because presumably it is too expensive to drain them. I conclude by adding some photos I took showing the conflict between development and conservation: