Tracking & Perception
Northern Songlines, North Maine Woods
April 17-19, 2024
“Have a look at the course description and let me know if you have any questions. I’m always happy for a chat with interested trackers!”
Led by Daniel Hansche, this course is a departure from tracking as usual. Delve into an exploration of the broad influences that lead us to the conclusions that we arrive at, and the honing of approaches that increase our accuracy and abilities.
Daniel brings great vibrancy to tracking and leavers group with clearer pathways to their sense of conectivity. Activities include visual, auditory, tactile, creative, verbal and non-verbal approaches to broadening our familiarity with and awareness of who we're tracking and how we are perceiving.
Over the years of creating this unique course, Daniel has designed practices that are truly one-of-a-kind, and yet to be incorporated in the more common Western tracking approaches tracking.
If you find that your mind trips you up and beats you down along your tracks and trail, this will likely be a welcome respite from that experience.
The learning atmosphere will be rich & substantial, and soft. Though this is not an introductory course in ID & interpretation, it is here for anyone engaged in wildlife tracking.
For millennia trackers have cultivated an exquisite vision of the world far surpassing the original function of providing sustenance and safety. Similarly, artists have long-developed acute observation skills, expressing, and reproducing what they see. Participants’ ability to see the natural world as trackers and naturalists are enhanced to new depths. Entirely new approaches to perception await.
Historically, wildlife and tracking are widely considered among the earliest inspirations for humanity’s artistic expression. These eyes have always been keenly perceptive and trackers can glean much more in the field by observing nature using elemental principles of artistic observation. Line, texture, light, color, and form are explored individually as well as holistically. We take time to orient to these elements; expanding the tracker’s ability to see more in the field.
We practice track interpretation, observation of wildlife signs, and movement on animal trails. Exercises & practices will be within the context of the artist's eyes; enhancing the skills of the wildlife tracker, increasing your ability to perceive more of what's there, and presenting ways of seeing with greater ease & clarity.
Through discussion, hands-on practices, and exercises we will hone our skills in ways that have much relevance to all disciplines of wildlife tracking. With knees in the sand, sculpt the animals on their trails and gain understanding of track patterns & gaits. Learn to sketch what you actually see without judgement; counteract your patterning on images of “perfect tracks” exhibited in the field guides. Explore track characteristics without scale; break free from your ruler -and return to it with fresh eyes. View tracks from alternative perspectives; release yourself from seeing tracks as “upside-down” or “right-side-up.” Orient to the subtlety of color baselines; key into chromatic cues, and follow them along the animal’s trail.
Daniel Hansche is a tracker and a passionate educator with over twenty-five yers of consistent field experience. They have mentored hundreds and have taught many more through workshops, trainings, and seminars. A certified Track & Sign Specialist in desert and forested regions of the US, they are adept and ready to contribute in most any environment. Daniel creates an inclusive and thoughtfully challenging space for trackers and naturalists to grow within. They are ever enthusiastic in fostering the natural wildlife tracker -rooted in awareness, driven by curiosity, and called to adventure by track, sign, & trail.