Snowshoe hikes make winter bearable
By Kevin Nowak

A dozen people are huddled around each other, wearing jackets ands scarves and mittens in royal blue, red, purple, and gold. "What are some ways that animals stay alive during the winter" asked naturalist Andy Hutchinson. Our breath wreathes above our heads. "They hibernate," says a young woman. "They burrow under the snow," offers another hiker.

Fine strategies if you live out in the wild during a season of scarcity. In our more civilized world, I suggest other strategy to not only survive the winter, but also thrive in it: go out for a snowshoe hike.

Saco Bay Trails has three hikes scheduled this season. The first snowshoe was held on January 24. A second walk is scheduled for February 28, and another is expected in March, but no date has been set.

The first hike of the season was held at Horton Woods preserve on the Buxton Road, and it was splendid. A dozen or so hikers followed Andy on the bright Saturday morning. Andy conducted a brief pre-hike overview to get us in the mood, and to show us what we might see on the hike.

We had not walked more than a dozen steps before we were greeted by one of Horton's denizens. A flying squirrel poked his head out of a perfectly round hole in an old apple tree alongside the trail. We were able to watch the sunlight through his whiskers as he watched us. His very large dark eyes left no doubt he was active at night.

We came across some older tracks that may have been those of a short- or long-tailed weasel (also called an ermine.) Fresh deer tracks were apparent from the beginning of our hike and continued to criss-cross in the woods around us for the entire hike. We could see where the deer stayed close to small hemlocks - food for them in the winter. Large deer highways pointed into low-lying areas, thick with dense groves of hemlock that are used for bedding down. In fact, we were probably watched by deer in some of these areas as we noisily crunched past.

We eventually descended to a frozen wetland through which Stackpole Creek runs. In the summer, this area is a rich and verdant body of water with grass waving in the breeze. This day the wind was still there, but it looked very different. The dark green woods opened into an expanse of brilliant white, etched here and there by the bare branches of a few low shrubs. The wind spun up snow devils in the open flat.

This forest/marsh edge is a biologicaly diverse area. I scanned the trees on the forest edge, looking for hawks that might be themselves searching for prey. None today, although Andy reported seeing probable Northern Harriers flying in these woods.


We started moving again to get warm, and the trail took a series of short but steep rolling climbs. We noticed signs of past logging, but were pleased to see a good number of large pines and hemlocks standing tall. Hop hornbeam, beech, red pine, and red oak are a few of the other tree species we saw here.

Some of us turned back to our cars after we reached the marsh, but most of us continued to the new bridge over Stackpole creek. No trail continues across the bridge - yet. The bridge crosses the stream near an old beaver dam that marks a sharp transition from open marsh to winding forest stream. It also sits under a large wolf pine - a combination of ingredients that makes it a natural focal point, and our next rest stop. A few more of us turned back at this point. In the end, five of us completed the hike into the wildest part of the preserve.

It was here that we found a tree with unusual carvings on it. The small maple had been girdled and killed by mice eating bark under cover of a previous year's snow. We also found a place where a tiny yearling deer and an adult bedded down for a brief rest. Their bodies made perfect "deer molds" in the snow.

We came across the broad trail indicative of a wide, waddling porcupine. The animal left a telltale mess where he stopped to eat in hemlock groves. The snow around these spots was strewn with bits of dark bark and pieces of branches he snipped off from the green canopy. At one point, we could scent the particular "pine-sol" odor that these animals leave behind if they have been in an area long enough. Here Andy told us of a porcupine den in an old pine tree along Saco Bay Trail's Sylvan Trail. This den is alongside the trail, and easy to spot. Porcupine dens have a distinct odor, and this one has a huge pile of decomposing droppings in front of it.

It was in this rear section that one of us found what could have been bear scat in the summer. Another hiker had also heard of a bear in this part of Saco. No bear sightings on this day, although we had some fun checking out a classic-looking den site behind a huge fallen pine.

We spooked some deer on our way back to the car, and watched them through the open woods from a small rise. An interesting track here, although a bit old and faded, may well have been from a fisher - a large member of the weasel family that is secretive and seldom seen.

Winter gives us a rare opportunity to connect with nature as the snow readily records wildlife activities. If we can listen, look, and smell for even a little while woodland stories can open up to us. Even without this revealed narrative, the clear winter sun on our faces, the fresh pine-scented air in our hair, and the radiant blue of the sky above invigorated and revitalized us. An excellent strategy for survival in a time of abundance.