Santa Barbara Tracker Certification 10/18/2015

The Wilderness Youth Project hosted a Track and Sign Certification in Santa Barbara, California on October 17–18, 2015.

We saw the tracks of 28 species, including 16 mammals, 7 birds, 1 herp, and 4 invertebrates. We spent the morning of the first day in the mountains east of town and walked down a hiking trail with some great dust. We saw tracks of gray squirrels, gray foxes, quail, and a praying mantis ootheca (egg case).

Later in the day we went under a bridge in town and saw a ton of amazing tracks including the tracks of a Mexican free-tailed bat (see the photos)! On day 2 we went to the beach and saw some beautiful bobcat, striped skunk, turkey vulture, and black-bellied plover tracks.

Congratulations to all who attended and a big thanks to Dan Fontaine for organizing the certification. I also want to recognize Evan who earned a 95! We had beautiful weather and a great group of folks.