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A largemouth bass, Micropterus salmoides, hunting among water plants.
Photo (George Grall Getty Images/National Geographic Creative) 

What animal walked through here?

Tracking Winter Wildlife
By Andy Avram, Interpretive Manager

A fresh coating of snow lies over the land, disturbed only by a single line of footprints. These tracks offer us a glimpse into this animal’s life—a few pages of its story on this winter day. What animal walked through here? What was it doing and where did it go?

By examining the size, shape and pattern we can tell it was a small mammal, likely a meadow vole. Following the tracks we see it burrowed into the snow as the tracks end in a small tunnel, about the diameter of a quarter, but resurface a couple feet away to carry on the journey. The tracks stop by some nibbled vegetation where the vole had a bite to eat, but suddenly the footprints become widely spaced as if the vole was startled into running away. It ran a short distance before the prints simply vanish. Looking next to the area where the footprints disappeared, we see what looks like brush strokes in the snow and realize our little friend was captured and carried off by a hawk or owl. Our footprint story ends here, but the bird of prey’s story continues on.

It is stories like these that make hiking in the winter so much fun, but we know that it sometimes takes a little extra motivation to leave a nice cozy home to brave the outdoors. Animal tracks, birds, trees and even interesting insects that crawl on top of the snow can be found all winter long and Lake Metroparks offers a number of opportunities to get out with a naturalist to discover these. 

For general nature try a Winter Nature Walk. If you would like a more in-depth program to learn about and look for animal tracks, join us for Wildlife Tracking.

Wildlife Tracking
January 24 at Veterans Park
February 28 at Pete’s Pond Preserve

Winter Nature Walk
February 21 at Penitentiary Glen Reservation

These programs are free. To register (required), click on the link provided. Registration may also be made by phone at 440-639-7275 or in person at the Registration  Department at Concord Woods between 8 and 4:30 pm.

Deer exclosure at Veterans Park

If you have driven past Veterans Park on Hopkins Road recently, you probably have noticed a large fenced area in the woods adjacent to the parking lot. This 10 x 20-meter structure is a deer exclosure, one of seven that are monitored by Lake Metroparks throughout the county. This area was selected after so many of the mature trees were taken down by the devastating winds of Hurricane Sandy.

If you are looking for a white-tailed deer inside the exclosure, you won’t see one. The space is designed to keep deer out to monitor the plants inside versus the plants on the outside. this will provide an index of what the impact of browse is by the white-tailed deer on that plant community.

The deer exclosure will have an important interpretive value to the public as, literally, they will see the structure from the parking lot and learn from it what impact it has on protecting the plant life within.

A small deer herd only makes a small impact, but too many deer consume the seeds of a forest’s future growth. Over time, these impacts create a visible browse line in the forest (see above).

Tom Adair, Parks Services Director, in an interview on the "Around Town" program on Mentor TV, said with the elimination of plant life, we will see a related loss or decrease in the diversity of insect life, bird life and mammal life as it relates to Veterans Park.

"Lake Metroparks has monitored the growth of white trillium in this area over the past 10 to 15 years and we have records that showed us that there were over 1,000 white trillium on a small plot, a 10' x 10' area," said Adair. "That site within the past two to three years has yielded no more than a dozen white trillium."

Plants inside the fenced area at Veterans Park are now protected from deer. Over time, this will show us how a healthy forest in Northeast Ohio can recover.

Click here to watch the video. The deer exclosure is the first segment of the program.

Passport to the Parks

Written by Laura Kessel, The News-Herald

Let's go for a walk.

Hopefully, that's a phrase you hear often in your life. If not, maybe it's time to make it happen.

And we'd like to make it possible.

Newly started, The News-Herald and Lake Metroparks are partnering in a program called "Passport to the Parks," which is a five-month series of chances for you and your family and friends to get out and enjoy nature in your own back yard.

We know budgets are tight, so we're hoping this will be a chance for a special time away from life's daily grind — even if it's only for a few hours.

Each month, we will announce a new park where you will be encouraged to head out onto the walking trails to experience what the parks offer.

On the trail in each park will be a marker that provides a code word walkers can use to enter a contest to win prizes from The News-Herald and Lake Metroparks.

This month's park is Veterans Park, 5740 Hopkins Road in Mentor.

Click here for more information about and directions to Veterans Park.

You can enter the contest one of three ways:

* Text the code word to 22700 (message and data rates may apply).

* Visit bit.ly/veteranspark.

* Call Lake Metroparks at 440-358-7275 and provide the code word to customer service.

You can enter once per park, and if you do all five parks, you'll have five entries into the contest to win prizes that include a three-month subscription to The News-Herald and a membership to Lake Metroparks Farmpark.

The signs will remain in place throughout the contest. Participants don't have to complete the first park before the second one goes up. You can check out all five in one month if you choose.

Those who complete all five parks will be entered into a drawing to win reusable lunch containers, courtesy of Lake Metroparks.

Up to 100 participants will receive the lunch containers.

The second park will be announced July 16.

For those interested who have further questions, call the Metroparks' customer service at 440-358-7275.