Animal Track Correspondences

heatherwitch:

I spend a lot of my time wildlife tracking, these are based off of the animal’s baseline behavior and gaits! This can be used with the track itself, a plaster cast, an image of the track, whatever. Note: I’m only including the animals I most commonly track in my region.

  • Black Bear – Confidence, forging a new path, taking what you want, uncaring, large but timid. 
  • Bobcat – Being unseen, exploration, awkward but pulling it off, observer, intuition. 
  • Cougar – Stealth, power, laziness, badass but dorky, achieving goals. 
  • Coyote – Curiosity, relaxed, distracted efficiency, being the center of attention, trickster.
  • Crow – Self-confidence, boldness, community, making yourself heard, bravery.
  • Deer – Awareness, thinking things through, gentleness, quick action, standing your ground.
  • Domestic Dog – Uncontrolled energy, passion, pure happiness, instinct, curiosity.
  • House Cat – Observing, cautious but not quite enough, feeling out of place, instinct, memory.
  • Rabbit – Caution, friendship, endless cycles, listening, playfulness. 
  • Raccoon – Bold, powering through, resourcefulness, not giving a shit, caring for others. 
  • River Otter – Playfulness, grace, paternal energy, having fun without worrying about the consequences, using what you have. 
  • Wolf – Efficiency, companionship, being the top dog, grace, resting, family. 

Do you have any favorite reference books about PNW wildlife that you would recommend? There are so many, and it makes it hard to choose which would be good to start with.

heatherwitch:

You came to the right place my friend!! I’ve been hoarding collecting field guides since I was a kid 😀

North American wildlife books:

PNW specific:

PNW specific plants (sorry I couldn’t resist!!):

  • Plants of the Pacific Northwest Coast if you don’t have this book, GET IT. Even if you don’t really care about plants. It covers most of the basics and you will turn to it eventually. Mine is so well-loved that it’s falling apart.
  • Medicinal Plants of the Pacific West + Medicinal Plants of the Mountain West were both forced upon me when I was a little nerdy child by my mentor. Super helpful if you’re interested in wild plant medicine! Not so much for plant ID!
  • I tend to use Audubon more than Peterson, but I have a LOT of plant books because you usually have to cross-reference (or have 6 different books out in my case) to ID plants. Again, there are apps out there too! 

Whew! That was maybe 1/10th of my books? Probably lower than that! I’d be happy to recommend more specific things too, I most likely have a couple of books covering the topic 🙂

heatherwitch:

I’ve gotten requests for this so many times, so here is (finally) a list of blogs that I enjoy following/have similar content to me. If you aren’t included in this list but we’re mutuals that interact, it’s 110% because I’m brainfoggy bitch and it is not because you don’t deserve to be mentioned ❤

A-C:

D-F:

G-K:

L-M:

N-P:

Q-S:

T-U:

V-Z: