Leave No Trace

February 24, 2025

Essay and photos by Joe Mish

The fox caught the tail end of the crow’s conversation with the bear and the weasel, so had just enough time to grow a thick fluffy tail. The fox does its best to survive in a snow-covered landscape along the South Branch.

“Leave no trace,” sage advice from the earliest people who lived entirely off the land, is still a useful reminder for those who spend time out of doors. Today the words are meant as an environmental caution to leave the outdoors better than when you found it. Allow the next visitor to experience the pristine woods, water and landscape as if they were the first, and not the last to arrive on the scene.

Many organizations, including the boy scouts, promote a list of ethical behaviors under the banner of, ‘leave no trace’, consistent with keeping wild areas preserved in a natural state, and free of overuse damage.

The original intent of those words was passed down as a credo by which to live in harmony with nature and avoid conflict and increase chances for survival.

Competition for food often involved violating neighboring territory. Any footprints, damaged brush or broken branches would reveal a hunter or warriors’ presence to their enemy. Likewise game animals are alerted by any physical changes or scent. A bare patch of ground among leaf litter, or a trail of footsteps across a dew drenched meadow, will turn a fox inside out and cause a deer to stop in its tracks. I walked into the woods, well before sunrise, during a fall bowhunt. Two hours later a red fox walked by, and when he crossed the path I took, it sniffed the ground and ran off at full speed.

A broken branch is a visual sign and will retain the scent of who or whatever broke it. Any alteration to the natural order of the environment is a neon sign to man and animal that some interloper is about or a game animal is close.
Whitetail bucks will break a fine branch where it makes a scrape and leave the scent from his preorbital glands. That location becomes his post office which he checks daily. An astute hunter will know this is a good location to harvest a buck.

Want rabbit stew? Watch for fine branches close to the ground cut off at a forty-five degree angle, as if by razor. Find a number of fine broken branches, higher off the ground, with ragged ends, it is clear sign deer were browsing.

Trappers, whether paleo or current day, do their best to leave no footprints in the mud or disturb vegetation. They will always walk in the water, upstream, as the visibility is clear, and sign easily seen. Aware also, that the downstream water is muddy and an enemy or trap thief will be alerted to the trappers’ presence. Muddy water may betray the presence of game animals such as waterfowl or deer.

A subsistence hunter or trapper will look at the natural world through the eyes of the wildlife and realize the focus on a single species is a fools’ errand without considering the impact on the natural community in which it lives. Each life form causes ripples throughout the community and self-awareness is mandatory for good stewardship of the natural world. To leave no trace is to reduce unforeseen impact on the natural community, of which we are temporary tenants.

Winter throws a wet blanket of snow upon the world, which nullifies leave no trace. Though temporary, it can have existential consequence on wildlife. It is as if the vegetation made a covert agreement with winter, to provide a fluffy white blanket, to protect the plant life from the cold and hide it from hungry animals during the most critical period for survival. The bear and the weasel were given a heads up about the secret agreement from a talkative crow. They knew their survival was in jeopardy, so the weasel evolved to turn white in the winter, wearing a cloak of invisibility. The bear decided to likewise, disappear completely, though in a warm den, sound sleep under the heavy blanket of snow.

A layer of late winter snow provides a detailed account of wildlife activities. A set of fox tracks continue in a relatively straight line as the fox travels efficiently between points of interest. It is clear when scent or sight caught the attention of the fox as the distance between tracks change and a depression in the snow reflects where it sat down to listen or watch for food, a love interest, or danger. No matter the scenario, the daily travel plans of the fox are revealed in the snow as headline news to any interested subscriber.

Ruffed grouse will fly into deep snow, leaving only a small round entry hole, as if some invisible hand excavated a random cavity in the snow. Momentum takes them several feet from the point of entry where they hide under virgin snow, leaving no trace of their presence. When disturbed, the  grouse will explode from under the trackless white cover, like a feathered missile, to create a shower of glistening snow, accompanied by the sound of wildly beating wings, gathering air for a vertical takeoff. The heartbeat of the passerby who disturbed the bird, matches the heart rate of the frightened grouse.

Snow is the nemesis of ‘leave no trace’ advocates, as it bears witness to the otherwise covert lives who live by leaving no trace.

Fleshy footed animals like skunk, opossum and this raccoon, will den up in very cold weather, snowy weather and appear to emerge enmass when the temps rise.

Author Joe Mish has been running wild in New Jersey since childhood when he found ways to escape his mother’s watchful eyes. He continues to trek the swamps, rivers and thickets seeking to share, with the residents and visitors, all of the state’s natural beauty hidden within full view. To read more of his writing and view more of his gorgeous photographs visit Winter Bear Rising, his wordpress blog. Joe’s series “Nature on the Raritan, Hidden in Plain View” runs monthly as part of the LRWP “Voices of the Watershed” series. Writing and photos used with permission from the author.