One morning last fall, we had a squad of raccoons wander across
our yard. The kits were big enough that I couldn’t tell them apart from the mom.
They scooted past the house and over the back fence. We watched as they clambered around the trees, before disappearing down the hill.
They’ve moved on, though. Only Mom Raccoon is around now.
How do I know?
Well, I found Mom Raccoon’s tracks recently, when we had an unexpected snowfall.
They were visible from our living room window—a neat little line across the back yard.
When we went outside later in the morning we hunted around and found the rest of her trail.
Apparently, Mom Raccoon came around one neighbor’s house, crossed our driveway and wandered up into the other neighbor’s yard.
Then she circled back down to our driveway. A line of trees on one side had blocked most of the snow, and she seemed to like that!
When she reached our fence, she tiptoed along our railroad-tie retaining wall and ducked under the fence. From there, she wandered across the backyard. Just like last summer, she she climbed over the same section of fence and disappeared down the hill.
We didn’t see her do any of that! We just read the story in the snow long after she was gone. I’m sure she’s around a lot more often than we realize.
We just can’t tell—unless it snows.
Have you ever found a story in the snow?
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