Sarah Spaeth admires bear marks on a tree at the Duckabush River. Photo by Jessica Plumb.
In May 2022, Sarah Spaeth, Jefferson Land Trust’s Director of Conservation and Strategic Partnerships, will be teaching an “Intro to Animal Tracking” class through CedarRoot Folk School. This two-day, in-the-field workshop is a great opportunity to deepen your understanding of and connection to our local lands and wildlife.
This class will cover the fundamentals of animal tracking, such as track shapes, gait patterns, rubs, chews, scrapes, beds, scent marks, and territorial marking. Sarah will also share where to look for tracks, considerations of tracking on a variety of substrates, and tricks for telling how old tracks are. Everyone will have the opportunity to make a mold of a track in the field. Final locations are pending, but will likely include Land Trust preserves.
Sarah holding a mold of tracks similar the ones students in the class will be making.
An experienced and passionate naturalist, Sarah has helped protect habitat, farms, and waterways at Jefferson Land Trust for more than 25 years, and brings a landscape-scale perspective to tracking the animals who share this home with us. Since 2012, when she took her first animal tracking class, Sarah has studied with Wilderness Awareness School’s Wildlife Tracking Intensive Program and has also led basic wildlife tracking workshops for CedarRoot Folk School and the Land Trust. In 2020, she earned her Track & Sign Specialist Certificate through CyberTracker North America.
No experience is necessary to take the class, which will be held on Saturday and Sunday, May 7 and 8, from 9 am – 4 pm. Cost is $200. Learn more and register through the CedarRoot Folk School website.
