Mammal Tracks : Life-Size Tracking Guide [Spiral-bound]

Lynn Levine (Author), Martha Mitchell (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 2001

This mammal tracking guide contains life-size tracks as well as illustrating movement patterns. The guide uses the four basic movement patterns (walkers and trotters, waddlers, bounders and hoppers) as the key to identification. Track measurements are provided along with a ruler on the edge of each page. The tracking guide is printed on waterproof paper.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"This quick and easy to use tracking guide is a great starter for young and old." -- Paul Rezenendes author, "Tracking & the Art of Seeing" and "The Wild Within"

About the Author

Lynn Levine MS, is a consulting forester and environmental educator for over 20 years. Since 1988 Lynn has been teaching tracking. She is co-author of "Working With Your Woodland." She is a PHd candidate in Environmental Studies at Antioch New England Graduate School.

Martha Mitchell MS, is a forest ecologist, environmental educator, and illustrator for over 20 years.

Product Details

• Spiral-bound: 16 pages
• Publisher: Heartwood Press (January 1, 2001)
• ISBN-10: 0970365403
• ISBN-13: 978-0970365408
• Product Dimensions: 10.3 x 8.6 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,150,193 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An "ah-ha!" type of book., May 3, 2001

By 

Laurel Bishow (East Stroudsburg, PA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Mammal Tracks : Life-Size Tracking Guide (Spiral-bound)

It has been so hard to find a decent tracking book, but now here's a good one. What I like best is that it gives me a game plan for determining what type of tracks I'm looking at. In the past, I've been overwhelmed trying to find the tracks in front of me in a book. This book has me first looking at how the tracks are laid out in comparison with each other: hoppers, bounders, waddlers. There are plenty of pictures and explanations to guide me. Just this little change in perspective taught me a lot about the animals I am trying to track. From there, I'm given more ideas on what to look for and what the tracks are telling me. This book is not only teaching me how to identify tracks (which alone is pretty good), but it is also teaching me about the animals themselves and how they move and interact with their environment. A few days after getting this book, my boyfriend and I went skiing. As we rode the chairlift over the snow, we both spotted some tracks beneath us and in one voice shouted "Ah-ha! Bounders!" It was a joyous start to really understanding mammal tracking.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Pure Magic ..., February 7, 2001

By 

Kathy Ornstein (The Wilds of NJ, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Mammal Tracks : Life-Size Tracking Guide (Spiral-bound)

This informative, easy to follow guide has truly been designed to be used on nature walks. One of the amazing things about this guide is in its appeal to young and more mature readers alike. The large pages and clear drawings (not to mention the waterproof paper) allows you to put the pages right on the forest floor or on the snow, to get a true side-by-side comparison of the tracks.

The authors have taken great pains to teach the reader how to determine not only the type of animal's tracks, but what the animal may have been doing, with examples along the way. The novice tracker will appreciate the authors' three-step approach to determining the type of animal you are tracking.

They also refer to the "magical experience" of tracking, which can often be lost in the clinical process. It's almost as though you are given permission to walk in the animal's tracks and "be" the marvelous creature you are tracking and learning about.

This book should be part of any outdoor organization's required reading. It takes the mystery out of tracking, but leaves the magic. Brava!!!

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Making Tracks to a Great Resource!, January 30, 2001

By 

Marcia Whitney (Woodstock, Vermont USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Mammal Tracks : Life-Size Tracking Guide (Spiral-bound)

Lynn Levine, a renowned tracker and naturalist in Vermont, has compiled a great resource for anyone interested in wildlife tracking. I've used many books and resources to help me learn how to track, and this is quickly becoming one of my favorites! It's very portable, waterproof, and has lots of great details that are easy to quickly access in the field. The best part of this guide for me is the fact that the tracks in the guide are life-sized! My husband and I were out tracking on our property a couple of weeks ago, and we found some old tracks that were either made by a cottontail rabbit or a snowshoe hare. As novice trackers, we sat there with a measuring card trying to deduce what critter made the tracks. When we looked up the two species in Lynn's tracking guide, we immediately SAW that there was no way that anything but a cottontail rabbit could have made those tracks in this part of the country. That is but one of many discoveries we have already made in only a few weeks of owning the book. This is a wonderful addition to our library that any tracker, novice or expert, would be fortunate to have!