February 19, 2023

For this phenology visit, I decided to explore a place I had never been, and went to Red Rocks Park! After a long week of very nice warm weather, there was not a lot to see in terms of wildlife tracks in the snow. Any snow cover was very icy, and the majority of the area was just mud. This made some tracks visible, but not as clear and identifiable as when were in Jericho.

In terms of wildlife, I only really saw gray squirrels running about, and the occasional domestic dog on a walk. All of the identifiable tracks that I saw were most likely just from the dogs walking through the area, although there were tracks of various sizes. Some had visible nails in the tracks and others didn’t, but they all had four very round toes, and the pads of the tracks were smooth, simple shapes. The larger track that I saw in the mud could have either just been a larger dog, or potentially a fox track, but I did not see any more that could confirm.

Those were the only visible and distinguishable tracks that I found on my visit. I saw a few squirrels running through the woods, but getting a clear picture was difficult because I had to stay a good distance away to keep them from running off completely. They seemed to be on the hunt for food and digging through the leaves, then climbing up into the trees.

The other thing I noticed out there that was not directly wildlife related, was this one species of tree that I kept seeing with a ton of holes in it. I am not sure what this can be attributed to or whether it is even related to the animals at all. It could also have something to do with disease or invasive species. But I was intrigued by this pattern and hope to look more into it!