There is nothing like an overnight dusting of snow to hint at the number of animals happy to contest the deed to your property. It is also striking to see how often the tracks of one species share space with another.
Two mallards on the left travelled from bottom to top. A raccoon passed on the right. Raccoons have a distinctive pattern whereby adjacent prints show one hindpaw and one forepaw.
One or two squirrels moved from lower right to upper left. When bounding, a squirrel touches down with its two forepaws. Its larger hindpaws then swing past on either side and land in front.
This shows a raccoon moving from bottom to top and (likely) a deer mouse moving from left to right. The raccoon tracks show the smaller forepaw beside the hindpaw. The mouse has a bounding pattern similar to a squirrel, but the tracks are smaller and they show a faint intermediate drag mark left by its tail.
A white-tailed deer wandered across the lawn. Well, the tracks do not tell me that this isn’t a mule deer, but I have only ever seen the former in my yard.
There are the inevitable Canada Geese heading toward the lawn.
I am sure to have missed many subtle tracks, but this combination of a mallard and a raven was obvious.