Animal Behavior

[PaddlingPitt]

What animal made these four, lineal tracks in the snow? What are the key identifying features? For perspective, the larger set of prints on the far right were made by a red squirrel.

 

[tketcham]

Ermine? At first, looking at the small image, I was thinking mouse but then I logged in and saw the tail drag marks.

Edited: Guess I should have stayed with my first guess.

 

[lowangle al]

Too small for ermine, I think they would be about the size of the red squirrel tracks. There are a lot of different kinds of mice out there and it is common to see the tail drag in their tracks.

 

[tketcham]

Too small for ermine, I think they would be about the size of the red squirrel tracks. There are a lot of different kinds of mice out there and it is common to see the tail drag in their tracks.

Ermine have a body weight about a third (+/-) of that of a red squirrel (based on a quick web search) but that's a good point about mouse tails.

 

[PaddlingPitt]

Thanks for responding, guys. Here in east central Saskatchewan, deer mice, shrews and meadow voles are all active during winter. In the 14 years we have lived here, I have never seen any of them running on top of the snow. But deer mice are active mostly from dusk to dawn. Or so I just read. They also commonly leave tail drag marks. Or so I just read yesterday. Shrews commonly leave tail drag marks, but generally move seemingly randomly, and not in a strict linear direction. Or so I read yesterday. Meadow voles are very common on our property, and our dog loves to hunt them In their tunnels beneath the snow. Above the snow they move linearly, and don’t leave tail drag marks. Or so I read yesterday. The image I provided above seems to not have tail drag marks in three of the sets of tracks. Yesterday I sent the image to a trapper, from whom we bought this property in 2008. Based on the tracks generally having no trail drag marks, he thought meadow vole. But not definitively so.

I would welcome more thoughts and input.

 

[scoutergriz]

This is not me and my coffee.

I've had a few moose cut through my camp on the way to the lake, I'll swear they think "this is MY trail, and I'm using it whether you're there or not"...

 

[Mason]

I'd say mice or voles. Ermine wouldn't be going back and forth, and they typically dive beneath the snow every few jumps in powder. In harder conditions they have the typical mustelid diagonal paired tracks.

 

[Boreal Birch]

Ermine also know as weasel, have tracks as big as red squirrels even the smaller least weasel has fairly big feet, so not a ermine. My guess would be some kind of vole which have short tails. Later today, I will look under my bird feeders to see what the red back voles in my part of the world look like in the tail dragging department.
Have to get back to the finish of the Iditarod Sled dog race. Ryan Redington grandson of the founder of the race, Joe Redington has left Safety, Alaska en-route to Nome.

 

[Boreal Birch]

I had a hard time finding red back vole tracks. Under the bird feeders the snow is packed snow, no new snow lately. Most all the voles at this point in the winter are living out the season under three feet of snow, nice and snug in their subnivean environment. I did find one set of vole tracks crossing a snowshoe trail. The stubby vole tail left continuous impression between its foot prints in the less than three centimeters of wind blown snow.

 

[Glenn MacGrady]

subnivean

I like words, and that's a new one for me.

 

[Boreal Birch]

Spell check and auto correct fought me long and hard on that word.
Every lawyer I’ve known (not many) fancied themselves as word persons. Not a bad hobby, confounding your friends with what you are saying, in a good way.