Tracking

Tracking is an ancient skill and one many of us have used in various lives
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For myself tracking was a very central part of my life while I was in the British Army in Borneo and recently I came across this article by Ray Mears which is interesting for what it says
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Here it is
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The core skills are essentially the same regardless of beast, environment and terrain.
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As time has gone on I feel something of a kinship with the animals that I follow,” he says
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We are all hard-wired to track, it just needs to be brought out of us – and the benefits for the amateur naturalist if they develop these skills means they will quite simply increase their chances of seeing wildlife
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When Mears teaches tracking he tells his students that when surveying the landscape for clues it is like watching an old television warming up – at first you don’t see anything, but in time you start to see that there is more there than you at first realised.
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What is a track?
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That is the question, he says.
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You could say it’s a footprint, a disturbance, a hair left on a tree or snow on a branch that has been disturbed.
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It could be the indication of other animals in the area fleeing, giving away the presence of predators.
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It takes time, because you have to learn what is right before you can determine what is out of place.
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Mears’s technique is to gather as much information as possible by talking to locals or those with specialist knowledge.
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Then he will go to an area where he is most likely to find signs of the animal.
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If he hasn’t found any indication of that animal after 10 minutes he will move on to another area.
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When I go to look, I go with a passive mind, I want what’s there to reveal itself to me, Mears says
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Most people see a mark in the ground; I’m actually trying to see the foot that left it.
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When he does find something, he asks how old the track is; what was the animal doing when it left it; and what size and sex is the animal.
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Once he has found a hot lead, such as a fresh paw print or a hair stuck to a tree, he’ll start to build up a picture of how that animal operates in the wild by looking for more clues, much like a detective investigating a crime.
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Eventually he’ll know enough about his intended quarry to get a sighting.
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It’s a holistic activity where you try to tune into what is going on as the animals do, he says,
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That’s one of the reasons why it’s so exciting.
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It becomes very intuitive after a while and anybody can have a go.
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It’s simply a case of going out there and doing it.
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Ray Mears
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Indeed and when there are other predatory humans tracking you it becomes seriously important that you understand what the signs are saying!
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And when with good trackers it is simply amazing what they can read and explain about what or who is around