Nature Connection: Reading Nature’s News

For many years I led walks for schoolchildren through the woods, marshes, fields and beaches of Cape Cod. As you may imagine, this was rarely a quiet activity and many times we didn’t see much in the way of larger animals. Hearing us long before they saw us, they had retreated out of sight and stayed still until we passed. I always pictured them dancing and having a party after we had gone by. I realize that was my child-self at work, but it was fun to envision, especially when an especially rowdy and bouncy group of kids was involved.

Before you shake your head thinking about excited, noisy kids, let’s just say adults aren’t really much better. They chat nonstop on a walk as well.

In the world of the hunter and the hunted, of predator and prey, quiet is one of the best attributes an animal of any size or stature can have. Many animals, birds and insects move stealthily, rarely crashing around like humans. When they hear an unusual noise, they first assume it to be a threat. They stop, stay still as a statue and constantly assess the situation. If you’ve ever approached a wild rabbit in your yard, you’d see their ears, eyes and nose in constant motion and alert. Get too close and they would turn and run, but if you kept your distance and didn’t look them in the eye, they might relax and go back to eating the dandelions.

Many times, people walk in the woods with a friend, catching up, laughing and shuffling their feet. To a deer or fox, this sounds like an army coming through, and in most cases they will simply slink away or hide until you pass. This is true of birds, snakes and turtles as well. Many of us have tried to sneak up to a pond where a dozen or so painted turtles are sunning themselves. Blink and they will have disappeared, silently slipping into the water and submerging themselves. You might hear the plops and splashes of frogs jumping back into the water as well.

Butterflies will move away from us in many instances, though bees don’t seem to have a lot of personal space issues.

Learning to read nature’s news is an ongoing but very enjoyable process. She leaves us signs everywhere. We just need to figure out how to evaluate and translate them.

Most of us are aware that many animals leave tracks behind. These are easiest to see and follow when the dirt is free of leaves and a little damp. We can find tracks in sand as well, but sometimes the sand is dry or windblown and the tracks are distorted and hard to pin down. The more we learn about tracking, though, the better we become at interpreting what we are seeing. If you are new to this, there are many good guidebooks as well as nature walks you can join to help you improve your skill.

Most leaders of bird walks and plant walks can also identify and explain common animal and bird tracks, so it’s always OK to ask if you see something. 

Other signs that an animal has been around include their scat, a polite word for poop. Often these signs are included in tracking guides. They vary according to location, size, food eaten, etc. Many of us are aware that owls disgorge pellets, but so do many other birds. These pellets usually contain the indigestible parts of their meal, such as bones, fur, toenails and feathers. This means you can even figure out what they ate, something children adore. It has just the right mix of creepy and scientific to engage their interest.

Serious trackers can read a landscape like a book. They can tell if a twig has been snapped, what animal made that barely discernible trail under the shrubs, and what turned over the log. They know how and where to find nests and dens because they’ve studied the area over many years and know the weather patterns and the location of the sun when the dens are in use.

Plants don’t talk, but they tell us plenty. We know when a plant needs water because they become wilted and appear to be dying. We can also tell when they are getting too much sun or something is eating away at them. A walk in the woods will tell us which trees were once cut down but grew back as a twosome. We can see where a tree twisted and bent itself to follow the sun or where it pushed through to tower over the other trees nearby. All this without one word.

If we look and listen carefully, we can learn a lot about nature. We don’t need anything fancy, though a few good guidebooks will be helpful. I know a lot of people are using apps such as Merlin and iNaturalist and that’s OK, but they are far from always correct. If it’s telling you a bird from Africa is singing outside your window, for example, which does sometimes happen, it’s good to check other sources. Sometimes it really is a bird from Africa, but that is pretty rare and would need to be confirmed by an expert.

There’s enough going on outside our homes and neighborhoods that we don’t need to add exotic anythings to our list. Get to know the locals first. Learn their habits and see how they change seasonally. Nature always has something going on. Just get outside. She’ll be happy to teach you whatever it is you’d like to learn. We just have to be open and willing to accept that nature’s ways may be mysterious, but they are almost always practical as well.