December 15, 2018: There's a Story in these Tracks

There's a story to be told in these tracks, but I don't know what it is.  On Monday I noticed a plethora of turkey tracks running along the ice near the shore, and following them I saw that they came from far across the lake.

Co-mingling fox and turkey tracks.

The turkey highway turned right to follow the shoreline.

With the ice being thin, I wasn't about to follow them to see where they came from from, but I did venture out a few feet to investigate a larger disturbance in the snow amidst the turkey highway; I could something occurred where a set of fox tracks collided with the turkey tracks.

Even fox slip and slide on the ice.

The fox had clearly spent some time here poking around on the ice.

Looking for something of interest.

But what's the story?  Who was there first?  I couldn't tell which tracks were on top of the other.  The animals certainly didn't encounter each other as both animals would be extremely obvious on the open lake in daylight (turkey roost at night) and there is no sign of concern on the part of the turkeys - the tracks pass straight through.  I'd say the flock of turkeys just took a path across the lake and the fox happened upon the tracks sometime later.  But why all the interest paid by the fox?  Perhaps a turkey left a dropping there that caught the nose of the fox.  It will be just one more mystery of nature that goes unsolved.

A bit farther along the lake I saw where the fox came up off the lake to leave its marker on the shore.

Several sets of tracks here - a pair, or a repeat visit?

A little scratching and a urine deposit.

It then turned around and backtracked on its tour of the shoreline.  In the track I found some prints on the ice which showed good examples of fox prints with the two toe claws visible.

If you see claw imprints (on left) you can be pretty sure it's a fox rather than a bobcat.

Then a couple of days later I saw the likely culprit taking another late afternoon trip across the lake.

It's looking like this could be a fun winter for fox watching.

Alas, all the snow is now gone.  The warm weather on Monday melted all the snow we had on the ground, but it didn't re-open the lake, so ice-in on December 8th looks secure.

A warm, rainy day on Monday meant the end of tracking, but it provided good skating conditions.

Ice in was a few days earlier than the recent trend line but well within the normal range.  On Thursday, after a couple of cold days I cut a hole about ten feet from shore and found 4" of solid ice.  By Friday afternoon after cutting a few more test holes I decided it was safe enough for a skate within Marion Cove, but no venturing farther out than that.

Good ice for skating on Friday in the cove.

Rain yesterday could mean even better skating conditions.  Winter activities have arrived, but New England weather will dictate whether we'll be skiing, skating, or hiking next.

Standing water on the ice this morning, just waiting for a quick freeze.