Last Saturday we had some snow. On Sunday morning we noticed a few interesting tracks. There were the usual rabbit tracks and you now how farmers feel about rabbits. We have meadow voles at the farm and it was quite interesting that we could make out tunnels that they were making in the four to five inches of snow that fell.
If the snow was much deeper, we might not have even noticed them. These mice construct a labyrinth of tunnels that conceal their movements from predators. The snow acts much like an igloo and insulates their nests from the bitter cold. The voles tend to survive better when winters have more snow.
The tracks here are from a racoon that is seeking refuge in the old barn. The digits are quite distinct and make very interesting patterns in the snow.