December 14, 2014

Many of you know that the Dr D family lives in a 140-year old farmhouse. Our property also has a gorgeous old barn (which currently houses my husband’s workshop, and provides extra storage for our attic-less and basement-less house.) Since our property slopes downward from the street toward the house, part of the barn roof is actually at ground level. The other day, I was walking by the barn and saw these mysterious tracks on the barn roof.

It may be difficult to tell the size of these tracks, but I would say each footprint was approximately 2 to 3 inches long.

What on earth could have made these prints on my barn roof? I’ve never seen a stray cat in our neighborhood, but I’m sure it’s possible. I hear there are coyotes around, but I’ve never seen one. Raccoons have long, thin, pointy feet, and these prints aren’t. Yeti? Unicorn? Chupacabra?

My best guess is a fox. We have one who lives in the woods along the perimeter of our farm (we even named our property Fox Valley Farm in honor of our resident fox.) Would a fox climb a low roof like this? It seems odd but I don’t have a better explanation.

Even though we live in the midst of suburbia, the amount of wildlife on our one acre property is amazing. In addition to our fox, we have several red-tailed hawks, gray and brown squirrels, toads, chipmunks galore, rabbits, a band of blue jays and woodpeckers of many varieties. Every day brings a new animal to identify! Clearly with all of this wildlife, I need to improve my tracking skills.

What do you think?