Garden Prints

The sun is shining brightly and the sky is blue.  When I looked out the window this morning I noticed some interesting tracks in the garden.  I put on my boots, hat, and coat and headed outside with the camera.  This first set of prints are on the patio at the top of the ramp from the basement.  I'm pretty sure they belong to a skunk.  The diagonal pattern is distinctive.  These tracks went down the ramp to the basement door.   We give the outdoors to the critters after dark with good reason.  I must have been sheltered from the wind by the house because at first it seemed quite nice out but it was really cold.



I headed over to another set of promising looking footprints.  These I think, and really hope, are fox tracks.  The straight line of double register prints make the chances of my wish being true very good indeed.  If the fox has returned to our garden, it is most welcome.   In its absence the numbers of mice have increased dramatically.  We haven't had a lot of new snow, but now the wind was blowing hard enough to make swirls of snow that danced across the garden.  I found more tracks from mice and birds to photograph, but with the temperatures in the teens, and the wind incredibly cold I headed in. When I checked my pictures I found that the longer I stayed out, the more blurry my photos became. Maybe I was shivering enough to move the camera or maybe I was in a hurry to get back inside.  It's too chilly outside today for me.