South Texas Tracker Club (Class
Calendar)
South Texas Tracker Club is a chance to meet on a regular
basis and spend time learning about animal behavior and animal tracks
of local, Texas wildlife in the San Antonio, Austin and South Texas ecosystems.
The goal behind tracking and wildlife studies in the field is to learn more about
our local ecology while becoming better trackers and better naturalists.
South Texas Tracker Club meets once a month, on the last Sunday of the month. The
cost is $5.00 per meeting, and each meeting usually lasts at least a few hours.
We discuss one short tracking or naturalist topic, identify at least one new track
and then spend some time tracking, trailing and studying nature - usually around
the quarry and Cibolo creek.
There is an amazing amount of wildlife activity around the quarry to study, but
South Texas Tracker Club also tries to take field trips to other parts of South
and Central Texas. This allows us to look at animals, tracks and sign in and around
desert, coastal, woodlands and other eco regions.
We study tracks, scat, sign, dens, trails, lays, bones, feathers, bird calls and
every aspect of learning about the local wildlife and wildlife behavior. Additionally
we spend time studying the effects of human disturbance on wildlife regions and
corridors, identifying and recording specific patterns of ecosystem change based
on human impact on wildlife, and understanding how to mitigate or positively effect
that change.
South Texas Tracker Club is a great adjunct to other naturalist studies, such as
the "Master Naturalist" program or university degree programs. This is a chance
to gain valid "dirt time" while learning new information and participating in exercises
that increase awareness and pattern recognition.
This informal club will expand later into a full tracking and naturlist course,
but for now, the emphasis is on dirt time and preparation for a CyberTracker
tracking evaluation. We will be hosting an evaluation in this area sometime in late
spring or early summer, 2011, and possibly on a regular basis thereafter.
|
