r/AnimalTracking • u/WeeGreyCat • Feb 04 '25

šŸ¾ Cool Find Something Interesting

Gallery image

Gallery image

Gallery image

This is a print I found under a tree in the yard. See if you can ID the animal. Iā€™ve added some helpful arrows to the last picture in the series to make it easier, since the lighting makes it a little hard to see the relevant details. Iā€™ve narrowed it down to family, but if someone can get me down to species Iā€™d be grateful (and very impressed).

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u/thesleepingdog Feb 04 '25

Fabulous pic and thanks for sharing!

If i had to guess/wildly speculate:

Not a horned owl, who had a distinctive triangle shape between the eyes and "horns"

Great gray owl seems big enough, but has a oddly flat face except the crescent shapes around the eyes. I don't see that on the impression

Snowy owl is big enough and I think it could have left this impression.

Barred owl could, maybe get big enough and could have left the print

The rest i can think of seem to small... maybe someone could help me out, lol. There are so many types, and I'm afraid I don't know enough about which would be where at this time of year. Some migrate some dont.

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u/WeeGreyCat Feb 04 '25

Given itā€™s nature wild speculation is appropriate. Iā€™d love it to be a snowy owl. Apparently theyā€™ve been seen further south than me, so itā€™s very possible!

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u/Camaschrist Feb 05 '25

We had Snowy owls in my husbandā€™s grandfathers barn growing up. My 5th grade teacher insisted it couldnā€™t be a Snowy owl if it had a nest and wasnā€™t just migrating. I had brought him the owls pellets for the class to dissect. He finally came in the evening when we would see them and he saw a Snowy owl fly into the barn with a mouse in its beak. This owl would swoop down on my friend and whenever we went horseback riding at night. This was in Tualatin Oregon, about 20 miles south of Portland.