The Brunswick daily news. [volume] (Brunswick, Ga.) 1903-1906, 1903-05-17
TRAILING WILD ANIMALS.
Fascination In Following Footprints ot
Various Game.


Trailing deer is one of the finest
sports of America, either up in the
SHOWS of Manitoba or down in the
south and west, where the black
tailed deer abound in the hills. The
deer is swift and cunning and the
hunter must needs be strong in wind
and limb to follow where he leads and
very wise to unravel the story Of his
footprints. )
The elegant hoofmark of the deer
could never be anything but a deer's
imprint to the old hunter-but men
may live years in places where deer
are found and yet on coming across
a footprint be unable to determine
whether is was made by a deer or by
a sheep or a pig. Indeed, the foot.
prints of deer, sheep and pig, seen
singly, are remarkably alike and only
an expert can tell the one from the
other. :.
To trail deer successfully needs the
cunning of the North American In
dian, who knows from the mere touch
and smell of the track not only how
long ago the track was made, but also
the size and condition of the deer who
made it. The hunting Indian is as
cunning as the hunted deer himself;
no seems himself to enter into the
very working of the brute mind. The
first mistake made by the young deer
hunted is to follow too closely on his
game. If the hunter watches the trail
at his feet, instead of looking ahead,
he may stumble on his deer unawares.
This is what the boy hunter did In
Thompson Seton's little story of ''The
Sandhill Stag"
Sneaking along, watching the tracks
at his feet, he was SO startled when
tbs big cared grayish animals he was
after sprang suddenly up before him
that he could only stand still and gaze
as they bounded away, rising higher
and higher at each bound. Then, when
he goes to examine their trail, he
reads wonderful story. Between one
track and the next he finds blank
space OF Is feet, then another blank
after the next track, the blanks in
creasing to Is feet, then to 20, to rs
and sometimes even to 80 feet.
The tracks made by running deer
have spaces between them of from Is
to 80 feet. Running deer are wing
less birds. "They do not run at all,
they fly" said Thompson Seton, "and
once in awhile they come down again
~ low tho b{lIfaru with their. daintU
hoOfs."
If the hunter always followed on the
deer's trail he might follow for thou
sands of miles without having shot.
He must leave the trail when it
grows new and hot, make detour and
lie up to ambush in front. By clever
maneuvering strong man can al
ways run down the swiftest deer, and
then at the end OF long chase the
shortened blanks between the tracks
will tell the story of a deer grown
weary.
The deer often goes back on his
own trail. Sometimes, when the track
is dim, it is hard to tell which way 1t
leads. But the footprint is little
sharper at the toe than at the heel.
and when the trail leads over hill
the hunter can always tell which way
the animal came, for if he went up
the hill his spaces would be short,
through the labor Of climbing.
All manner of tricks are played by
hunted deer who know that they are
hunted. One thing they often do is
to return little way along their own
track and then, making great leap
to one side, race away in another di-
rection Sometimes when hard
pressed deer repeat this maneuver
time after time, finally lying down to
rest (having bounded aside from the
last traiD in a spot where they can
smell and hear the hunter long be-
fore he comes dangerously near. The
hunter, constantly finding himself on
cold scents, must patiently unravel
all the twisted story by the deer's
feet, barking back on the cold scents
until he finds where the real trail
begins anew-Chicago Tribune.