We learn to unravel the traces of a hare in the snow or hunting by trailing. A few more secrets from an experienced hunter to the opening of the hare hunting season How to find a hare bed in winter

Hunting for a hare at the beginning of winter after a powder is one of the best ways to test your hunting skills: endurance, attentiveness, the ability to recognize and read the trail, reaction and accuracy. A hare caught as a result of trailing is a reward received solely thanks to your efforts and hunting skills.

Differences between hare and hare tracks

The hare remains active in winter. It feeds at night, in the pre-dawn hours, and hides during the day, remaining on the so-called "laying down". Porosha - snow freshly fallen during the night, sweeps everything, and fresh night hare adventures read like an interesting, freshly written story.

In our places, two species are mainly found - the white hare and the hare. Belyak migrates to forests in winter, prefers copses, dense shrubs, overgrown areas. It feeds in winter by eating twigs and bark of trees. Rusak prefers open spaces, in winter he keeps to the edges, beams, small bushes, loves the area with a good view. Despite the snow, it continues to feed on withered grass and winter seeds, leftovers from vegetable gardens, digging it all out of the snow.

In many regions they live side by side. On good foraging grounds, their feeding areas often overlap and their tracks overlap and become confused. How to distinguish the traces of a hare and a hare from each other, since their habits, which means the places of lying and the manner of confusing the track, are different.

The main difference between the prints of one and the other hare is that the hare has wider paws, and the fingers are spread apart more, the hare already has a paw, fingers pressed closer. Therefore, the paw print of a white hare in the snow will be almost round, while that of a hare will be elongated, oval. There are additional differences as well. The hare's trail is more confusing, and when lying down it goes into the forest and dense thickets, including through deep snow. The hare has a discount, the trailer and racing tracks are longer. Because of its narrow paws, it will not pass through deep snow like a hare, so it prefers to move in more open places, including along already trodden paths and roads.

Where to look for a hare in winter.

As already mentioned, the hare goes out to feed at night and finishes it in the morning, at dawn, after which it hides for the whole day. So best to hunt it in the morning when he had already settled down and calmed down. The day should be chosen fine, mild with little wind. On such days, the hare easily rises from the bed, and does not sit there until the last, as in bad weather or severe frost. In addition, the noise of the wind will hide your steps.

They are looking for a hare trail, especially a hare, along rural lands, fields, gardens, mowing and meadows, under haystacks and stacks of straw, closer to the middle of winter in gardens. Belyak can be found in the floodplains of rivers overgrown with young willow, in young aspen and birch forests, in gardens and summer cottages, where he feasts on the bark of fruit trees.

The process of trailing a hare

The nightly adventures of a hare are quite monotonous. With the beginning of the night, he leaves the haul, first carefully looking around, and then, with fairly fast jumps, goes to the feeding places. In feeding places, it moves slowly in short jumps, very chaotically (confused). Between feeding areas, its run accelerates, and the length of jumps increases. Sometimes, on bright, quiet nights, hares begin to frolic and drive through the snow, then their jumps become especially long.

Having had a bite, at the end of the night, the hare goes to the daytime bed. In the process of this he begins to confuse the trail to confuse would-be hunters. His run speeds up, then slows down, he can return to his tracks, and then run further. It can return a little back to make a strong jump to the side and run further. It makes loops, runs out onto well-found paths and other people's paths, etc. During such a journey, the hare, depending on experience, performs each of these maneuvers from one to three times, and only after all this hides in its shelter.

The process of unraveling all the nocturnal hare adventures, usually from the place of fattening (feeding) to its very bed, is trailing. They start trailing by walking along the edge of a field or meadow, along forest paths or just along a country road, looking out for a hare trail. Usually, hare paths lead towards fields and the like in the direction of fattening, and from there to thickets and shrubs - to lying.

The direction of movement of the hare is indicated to us by its hind legs, their prints are larger, more elongated and located in front of the prints of the front paws. If we were lucky to immediately find a trail leading from the feeding places to the lair, go unravel it, otherwise head to the place of fattening and start tracking from there.

Types of hare paths (maliks)

All hare tracks can be divided into four types, fattening, racing, trailer and hare tricks like twos, threes and discounts.

Fat trace

The hare leaves it, moving slowly, in short jumps, usually while feeding or looking around. The distance between the front and hind legs is small, and the track itself in the places of fattening is very tangled, winding, can intersect with the tracks of other hares, often accompanied by hare droppings. Fattening monograms are usually not unraveled, but after going around the place of fattening in a circle, they look for a waste trail when the hare went to the bed, and they are already trailing it.

racing trail

The hare leaves a racing trail when it jumps at full speed. He can either run away from someone or just frolic, rushing back and forth. The distances between jumps are large, sometimes up to two meters, the front legs are parallel to each other, the distance between the front and hind legs is greater than when running. The racing track at the end is replaced by a small fat or slower running track.

Running (end) track

When the hare goes from the fattening place home to the laying place, its trail from the fattening place passes to a more purposeful, but still unhurried running (terminal) one. The distances between jumps increase, and the prints of the front paws go one after the other. It is this trail that is the most important, because it leads to the place where he is hiding. Actually, it is only on him that hare “arts”, loops, discounts, deuces and triples begin, with which he tries to confuse, to prevent you from reaching his bed. The running track, especially for a hare, can pass along well-trodden paths and roads, intertwine with the tracks of other hares and other animals, in this case you need to go along and look for a place where the hare leaves to the side.

Twos, threes and loops

Walking along the running trail, you will meet hare loops, deuces and triples. This suggests that you are getting closer to his bed.

The loop appears when the hare, having made a circle, returns to its track, crossing it or walking a little back along it. Loops usually appear closer to the bed, so when you see it you need to be more careful.

deuce- this is when a hare, having run forward, returns a little back in its wake, and then abruptly changes direction, making a discount or simply changing the direction of the run.

Troika occurs when the hare, having gone back along its track, nevertheless decides to move further in the original direction and again goes along its path. After the triple, there is usually no discount and the oblique after it rarely goes to the prone.

Discounts (estimates)

A discount is a big jump that a hare makes to the side of its track. A discount is usually made after a deuce, and the direction of movement after it usually changes sharply to perpendicular to the previous one. On the way to the shelter, the animal rarely makes more than three discounts or deuces with a discount. Usually, after the second time, it's time to start turning your head in all directions, looking for a hare.

Unraveling Maliki

So, what does the whole process of trailing a hare look like. Having found its trace (malik), first of all we determine its direction so as not to come to the previously abandoned prone. You can recognize it by fingerprints or by the position of the front and hind legs and the distance between the tracks, remember that in a hare the prints of the hind legs are in front of the front ones. We are heading along the found malik, a little away from it, so as not to trample. If he led you to the place of fattening, we go around this place in a circle in search of a waste trace, you should not waste time unraveling the fattening loops.

Having found the waste, we begin to trail it already, it will either lead to a new place for fattening, or two loops and discounts will begin, which indicates the proximity of the hare bed. The loops must be passed completely, otherwise there is a chance to go astray and get on the trail of another hare crossing the one you are looking for. If the malik went onto a path, road or other trail and went, or even merged with them, go along this path of three hundred to four hundred steps, in one direction and the other, until you find a place of descent. To determine a fresh print against the background of old ones, you can slightly crush it with your finger, the snow on the fresh one will crumble, while on the old one it does not.

Remember places where you can lose your track, trail crossings, etc. you may have to go back there. Usually, after the first loops, triples, deuces and discounts begin. You should be wary after the first deuce at a discount, and after the second you need to look around in all directions and be ready to shoot. Experienced hunters say that in no case should you stop tracking a hare. Even if you need to look around carefully, step in place, your stop can provoke a scythe to rush out of the shelter. If you cannot specifically determine the location of the bed, start carefully, in a circle, bypass the proposed area of ​​​​its placement, looking in the direction of the track.

Place of bed

How to find a bed? You need to pay attention to those places where the hare likes to hide. Rusak prefers to hide in places with good visibility, in bushes scattered across the field, in roots or near tree trunks on hills, at the base of snowdrifts and sediments, along ruts, hollows, near shelters like sheds, old huts or fences. White hare in early snow can hide in bushes near fields and on the edges, in heavy snow in the forest, deeper, in spruce forests, dense thickets, at eversion, near windbreaks, sometimes along the edge of forest glades.

The place of lying can be determined by a hill of snow, often different in color, with lumps of earth that the animal sketched when digging a hole for itself. But it should be borne in mind that, in search of a good bed, he can sketch several such slides in different places.

When you notice a hare lying down, do not look directly at him, this will provoke him to jerk, follow out of the corner of your eye, and approach not directly, but passing a little to the side. Having approached the place of prone, try to shoot him on the spot. If you raised a hare, you need to shoot after him. After the shot, carefully watch the hare. If he continues to run but behaved strangely, follow his trail, he may well be injured and without even leaving drops of blood he will collapse after running 300 - 400 meters. If, nevertheless, you missed, you don’t need to immediately track down the runaway hare, you still won’t keep up with him, and he will lead you until the evening. It’s better to lie low and wait, he may well, having cut a few circles, return to the prone position or simply calm down and lie down in another place, then drag him out again.

Equipment and weapons

Two things are important when hunting by trailing in winter, camouflage and the ability to walk for a long time, including in deep snow. This determines the selection of equipment and equipment for such a hunt.

In equipment, external camouflage is also important, in clothing, and noiselessness, and the absence of pungent odors, so try to adhere to the following rules:

• A camouflage coat should correspond not only to the season, but also to the external environment. So on the first snow, when not everything is covered with it, the camouflage coat should be with dark spots, but after heavy snowfalls it should be pure white.
• Clothes and ammunition should not rustle loudly, squeak or jingle, avoid squeaky leather or loudly rustling synthetics.
• Shoes should be wearable, comfortable, but at the same time not creak in the snow, rubber shoes, for example, sin with this. Boots or boots are well suited for such hunting..
• It is quite difficult to scare a hare with a smell, but avoid strong odors, clothes should be clean, preferably specially designed for hunting.
• If good shoes are enough for the first snow, then in winter it is better to ski in deep snow. Skis use wide ones, they also should not rustle loudly, and the bindings creak.
• For hunting a hare, usually smooth-bore guns are used, preferably machine guns, so that you can quickly fire several shots in a row. Accuracy is of great importance, so the barrel is taken by choke or pay. Shoot cartridge from #3 to #0 with a sharp shot.
• It is better not to take a dog for tracking, it will rather scare away the hare, raise it ahead of time, when you will not be ready for the shot yet.

Not all hunters keep hounds, but everyone is drawn to the hunt

And so, when the snow falls at night and the hares, leaving before dawn on their hay, make fresh tracks on it, the hunter sets off with a gun and without a dog to trail the hares. Trailing like a hunter means finding a trail of a hare from feeding for a day and following the trail to a hare.

In this way they hunt for a white hare. But in the forest it is difficult to notice a hare in its snow-white fur coat in time. Trailing a hare is more profitable in forests with clearings, in small curtains in glades, in pine swamps with a sparse willow forest, in tussocks with sparse woody vegetation.

Hunting for a hare is more productive. For a hare on powder - an interesting hunt. From a dozen tracks for feeding and from feeding, you must skillfully choose a track that should lead to hare loops before lying down. Will the hare jump off or not jump off while you are looking at his looping on the go? After all, it is not often possible to determine from afar the place where the hare lay down. One can object to this: "A hare's discount will show the way." So it is, but not entirely.

Here the hare made a deuce on the path, in the middle of the field. The hunter sees the trace of the hare back and forth ... but where to go? If the hare came along the path on the left, then, therefore, he went there, and if on the right, then in the other direction. When you can see on the path the place to which the hare walked back and forth, then the direction in which he went is also clear. But it is still unknown where and in what direction he threw himself off the path. This is where you get worried. Maybe he lies very close, he has been seeing you for a long time.

It happens like this: you walk along the troika sideways (after all, you are not supposed to follow the trail), and the hare made a discount in front and - jump! - Yes, and immediately lay down near the path under the bush. And you go straight to the bed, not knowing that she is here. And drive him away before the time.

“If I had gone sideways, I would have gone straight to the stump with yellow grass around. What if he's there? Is it permissible to go straight to the bed?”

“Let's say I go around a stump with yellow grass, there won't be a trace. And the hare, not having reached forty paces, lies against the stump in the ditch. I go around the stump, and he quietly flies along the bottom of the ditch. There he is already - rushing across the field, only a snowball curls behind him!

“No, it's not that simple. We have to follow the rules."

We talked about this with the hunter, sitting in the evening in the hut and cleaning the guns. That day we killed several Russians with him. Not regretting the two or three who had gone outside the shot, they discussed one case.

We walked the road along the lake, moved to the other side, closer to the winters. We see, on the road, fresh traces of a hare, large.

He must have gone to feed in the winter. Whether we will still take his trail from feeding is unknown.

Ahead, on both sides of the lake, there was a yellow island with reeds.

We look, the trail of the hare threw itself into the right island.

I put a comrade on the road - here the hare's move is right! Without checking, we go around this island. I think: “Where can the hare go?” There are only two such suitable places on the open lake. There was a hare from feeding, threw himself off and lay down here. I ran in, whistling, rustling with reeds. No shot! I went out, I see the hare going out to the side with a measured move - therefore, he left us. The trail went first along the road, then along the road itself, and from it - again to another island of reeds. It turns out that the hare did not lie in the first island. We look, he is rushing to the shore along the lake in his entire length - a huge, brown russachina! He lay tightly in the second island - they themselves drove him in vain when they passed the first island.

Annoying! First, go around the first island, make sure that the hare is not here, and drive him to the shooter from the second island. It wasn't the Rusak who fooled us, they fooled themselves. Together in such thickets it is easy to cope. One in the thickets can not be able to drive out the hare.

No matter how hard you try to put yourself in such a point that you can simultaneously see both forward and from the sides, you will not succeed. I tried in such cases to make some noise from behind and jump out further to the side - no. After all, a hare from a thicket will rather see where a person is, but he always hears and goes just in the direction where he is shielded from a person.

The next day we were expecting powder. During the night the weather was fine. Quiet, little frost. Stars. The sky is blue.

As soon as it dawned, we left. We went along the road through the spring field, and on the side, a few hundred meters away, there were winter crops. The stubble the day before stuck out from under the snow, and now everything is covered. The snow sparkled under the rays of the sun.

We finally noticed a russet malik on the road. But the road has already been covered up by passers-by, so you can't see which way the hare went. We walked half a kilometer in one direction - the trail does not leave the road. Let's go back: so far, we think, the hare would not have gone along the road, he probably went in the opposite direction.

And so it happened. We walked fairly well - and, apparently, the hare swept into the spring field, made a huge jump. It's good that it's sunny - in cloudy weather, such a jump on the slope, of course, you will overlook.

We went, while together, on one side of the track, about sixty paces from it. Fortunately, it can be seen far away: the trail turns pink in the sun, sparkles. We go, look at the trail, and at places suitable for lying around.

It turned white, a hint of silver turned on the snow, where the hare turned back - this is already a deuce. Now keep your ears open - not a hare, but a hunter. The rabbit's ears are always ready! On a double track, snow crumbs burn with multi-colored lights. Here is the discount. How he waved again! And went straight...

We now moved along the sides of the trail, each about fifty paces from it. I look ahead: far away I can see a rosy trail, and suddenly it ends, and ahead is the silver of a snowy tablecloth. There is a discount to the side at the end of the trail, so this process of the trail ended. Clearly, somewhere here, but where, when there are no signs on the plain? No, wait, in one place where the trail ended, the stubble is turning red, and in other places it is nowhere to be seen from under the snow.

I silently nod to my comrade, pointing out. I hold the gun with my left hand under the forearm at chest height, and raise my right fingers up, depict the stubble: it sticks out, they say! This is superfluous, of course: the hunter himself must understand where the hare lies when every grain on the trail is visible.

We began to approach the bed. Thirty steps from me and from a friend. A little closer, they got closer. I loudly: "Come on, go!"

Snow shot up, as if from an explosion, and the hare rolls. Comrade and dumped him.

The second Rusak was taken on arable land. He lay down between the layers of turf. Came close.

The third one was kicked out of the juniper bush; this one got very windy, forcibly calmed down and lay down. The fourth was taken in a willow bush on tussocks; on the fifth, on a steep bank of a stream, he made a mink in the snow. On the sixth, they shot at a stone on the slope of the hill; they were afraid that they would hide downhill.

We did not manage to take two more birds with one stone: one jumped far, the other missed.

It’s not worth going after a hare that has jumped off a bed: it will lie down a second time, but it won’t let it go.

When the snow becomes deep and compacted from the winds, the hares often dig quite deep minks in their puffs. Sometimes a snowstorm evens out both the hole and the hare's tracks leading into the hole. In such cases, the hare jumps out only when you almost step on it.

It happened to me once (this is not so rare in general), while stalking a hare on the trail, I ran skiing into his hole in a snow puff under the bank of a stream. I felt a push on the skis from below and thought that I had broken the ski ... In an instant, small shocks repeated, frequent as a shiver, snow dust rose in front of me to the height of my height, and a large hare jumped out from under the snow between my skis, rolled along the oblique lines up. I managed to make an unsuccessful shot when he was already hiding behind the edge of the coast.

A hare that has jumped out close must be released about thirty paces and shot at the front. Shot numbers 1-3 are quite suitable for this hunt.

Hunting on the trail from the approach is one of the most common methods of gun hunting for a hare. This hunt continues almost all winter. She is interesting and resourceful. She cares. And hunters appreciate excitement. The hare, let's say, is here for sure, but he is not! And either he is on the left, or on the right, or he will jump out in front. Exciting tension. And he always pops up not quite right and not where you expect.

HUNTING

When the snow becomes deeper, the food of the hare becomes difficult. Hares come closer to villages, to places where hay is concentrated. There are more hare tracks in gardens, on paths, in backyards, in places where hay is stored or scattered. Here begins a very interesting hunt on ambush.

The ambush is interesting not only for its prey, but also for the fact that it is possible to observe the behavior of a hare at night and when it does not suspect the presence of a person.

First of all, determine the hay barn or haystack that attracts the largest number of hares. It installs quite easily following the tracks. It often happens that the same hares visit different haystacks during one night. Hares then disperse to different places, and the time they visit one or another feeding place is indefinite.

For ambush hunting, it is very useful to attach hares to a certain barn or haystack. To do this, they put a bait tasty for hares in the form of a small clover (removed during the beginning of flowering), the remains of cabbage leaves, cabbage stalks and various root crops. Having become acquainted with such a place, hares will visit it in the most efficient way.

Lunar evenings are chosen for hunting. You have to set off for ambush immediately after sunset. The hare, having lain on the day from morning twilight until evening, hurries to feed as soon as it gets dark and the daily life of people subsides.

For sit-ins, they choose a place either in the barn itself, or near it. For visibility and freedom of movement, it is more convenient to sit at the barn so that the figure of the hunter does not stand out. To do this, it is better to make a small cover in a timely manner, to the sight of which the hares get used to very soon.

The most important thing when sitting on a hare is the complete immobility of the hunter and the absence of the slightest rustle. Therefore, when an ambush is arranged at the barn, the snow should be trampled so as not to rustle, shifting from foot to foot. When sitting on hay, it is useful to put some clothes under you to avoid the rustle of hay.

If the light of the moon is behind the hunter, it is most convenient to aim.

Belyakov guard on forest roads, laying hay for bait, or lay brushwood, freshly chopped aspen in a convenient place.

Malik is the name given to the entire path of the hare that was marked in the snow during the night, starting from his lair, where he spent the day, to fattening, that is, the place where he fed, and back to lying. Recognition of hare tracks, which are very diverse in nature, is of great importance, since for most rifle hunters tracking down hares, mainly hares, is the main, and sometimes the only available method of winter hunting.

First of all, it should be noted that the tracking of the whites is very difficult, and therefore they "trail" almost exclusively the hare. The white coat of the hare, which differs very little from the snowy surface, the intricacies of the passages and the usually strong place for the lair, are the reasons that allow the hare to almost always go unnoticed.

In addition, the convergence of a little white hare is always tiring, because the white hare extremely confuses its moves, fills paths, runs into fats and into the paths of other white hare, circles around, sword loops, and generally confuses the tracks so much that even the most experienced hunter spends a lot of time searching for hare.

Therefore, in areas where both hare and hare are found, it is very important to be able to distinguish them by the trail, which is given very soon. In the hare, which lives in the forest, where the snow is looser than in the field, the paws are comparatively wider and rounder, or rather, have widely spread fingers, so that it leaves imprints in the snow that approach a circle in outline; in the hare, the paw is narrower and less widened, and its footprint is oval, elliptical. When the snow is not very loose, with the so-called printing powder, fingerprints of individual fingers will come out, but the traces of the hare's hind legs will still be much wider than those of the hare.

More elongated and parallel to each other and slightly ahead of each other belong to the hind legs, and those approaching a circle in outline and following one after the other, in one line - to the front.

A sitting hare leaves an imprint of a completely different type: the prints of the front legs are almost together, and the hind legs lose their mutual parallelism somewhat, and since the hare, while sitting, bends its hind legs to the first articulation, the entire groove is imprinted on the trail, except for the paws. (In the figure, the imprints of the hind legs with grooves are shaded.) Except for this case, i.e., the seat, the traces of the hind legs always remain parallel, and if traces are noticed on loose snow in which the larger imprints of the hind legs go apart - clubfoot, then these are not the tracks of a hare, but of a dog, cat or fox when they walk in jumps. The same can be said about the track, in which one hind foot is strongly ahead of the other.

The normal run of a hare is large jumps, and he takes out his hind legs almost or completely at the same time, and puts his front legs sequentially one after another. Only with very large jumps does the hare put the front legs almost together.

hare footprints

Ordinary hare tracks are called terminal, since with such medium jumps he goes to fats and returns from them.

rabbit footprints

Fat traces differ from the terminal ones in that the paw prints are very close to each other and the individual traces almost merge. They are called fat because hares make them where they feed, slowly moving from place to place, often sitting down.

discount hare footprints

Discount or estimating traces are left by the largest jumps made at an angle to the original direction of the track. The hare tries to hide them, cut off his trail, before he decides to lie down. The number of discount jumps is usually one, two, three, rarely four, after which there are again ordinary, end tracks. For the most part, before the discount, the hare doubles its trail. Discount jumps differ from terminal jumps in the distance between the tracks and in the fact that the prints of the front legs are together.

chasing hare tracks

Race or wake tracks become a hare when he is scared away from the lair - and he goes with big jumps. They have a great resemblance either to discount ones or to terminal ones, but of the opposite direction, because the prints of the front paws are closer to the prints of the hind legs of the previous, and not the same jump.

From the den, in which the hare sat until dusk, the malik begins with fatty traces, which soon turn into trailers, sometimes leading directly to feeding, that is, to winter, to the garden, kitchen gardens or to a well-worn road. On fats, the hare always feeds in small, very continuous movements, often stopping and sitting down. Having eaten well, he sometimes runs and plays, and here he comes across racing tracks. Having run, he either again takes up food, or already at dawn he sets off with fat end traces to a new lair.

This complex confusion at the feeding site is called fattening, as hunters say, or - a fat trace. It consists of small, short jumps, never straight.

Before choosing a safe haven for the day, the hare begins to make loops, i.e., round off its course, again crossing its former traces. These loops sometimes occupy large areas, so that at point A (see the figure) it is quite rare to say with certainty, without turning the loops, whether the crossing traces belong to the convergent malik or another hare passed here. More than two loops are rarely seen.

Soon after the loops start dating deuces and triplets, i.e., doubling or building a trace, and the traces are superimposed on one another, so that skill is needed to distinguish a double trace from an ordinary one. After a deuce, the hare usually makes a discount to the side, but after a triple, which is relatively rare, for the most part there are no marks and the hare goes further a considerable distance.

Most often, a double and triple track of a hare is seen along roads or along the crests of ravines, where there is almost always little snow, and at the beginning of winter - in hollows, meadows and only that frozen streams and rivers. The length of twos, both in the same malik and in different ones, is very variable and varies from 5 to 150 steps. They undoubtedly indicate the proximity of the lair, and if a hare walks a considerable distance after a deuce with a discount, changing discount jumps to end jumps, then this is already an exceptional case.

Threes usually do not reach a significant length and the direction after them does not change and very rarely a discount follows them. The discount is almost always made at right angles to the direction of travel; after several discount jumps, several trailer jumps follow and again the second deuce with discounts. Often, Russians are limited to two deuces, but there are maliks with eight or even more deuces. This largely depends on the quality of the powder and the weather: if the powder is fine and the weather is cold, the hare walks a lot; if vice versa - walks a little. In addition, the later it stops snowing, the shorter the hare maliks, so if the snow was heavy and stopped at dawn (which happens quite often), then where you see the malik, there is also a hare, because all his previous tracks were covered with snow; it goes without saying that maliki then come across rarely.

The hare digs a lair in the snow, somewhere under a bush, at the end of the path, and crouching, cross-legged, laying his ears on his back, turns his nose to where you can always expect the enemy, that is, to the trail.

Among the abundance of ways to hunt a hare, hunting along a malik (the entire night path of a hare, displayed in the snow) is one of the most popular. And although the effectiveness of such a hunt is quite high, it requires experience and certain knowledge in order not to get lost in the abundance of traces that the hare is so skillfully able to confuse.

It is important to note that trail hunting is an excellent substitute for hunting with a dog. The only difference is that the hunter himself needs to unravel the hare tracks. Novice hunters, having tried this method of hunting for the first time, cannot recognize the malik the first time and figure out where the animal could have gone. The key to hunting success is the experience you gain over time. But so that you know how to read the tracks of a hare in the snow and avoid simple mistakes, we have prepared this article.

Traces of hare and hare

As a rule, hunting for fresh malik is carried out on a hare, and there are several reasons for this. Firstly, the white color of the hare makes it almost invisible to the hunter, and secondly, this type of hares confuses tracks very well, and it is sometimes difficult to determine its location. Even if you find a place for the day of the animal, the likelihood that it will go unnoticed is very high.

In this regard, if you live in an area where both types of hare live, it is very important to be able to distinguish them by malik. The key difference is that the hare's paws are slightly rounder and wider than those of the hare. Wider paws contribute to the fact that the animal moves faster on loose snow. The paw prints of the hare are more oval and long, as they are on average larger than their relatives.

Traces of hare and hare in comparison

Time and place of hunting

It should be noted right away that it is very difficult even for an experienced hunter to determine when the animal was in place, if before that there had been no powder or strong wind for a long time. You can trail all day and still not see the beast. Therefore, in order for the hunt to be successful, it is worth going out on it immediately after a good snowfall or strong wind, which the old malik could cover.

When hunting in fresh snow, be prepared for a lot of walking. Therefore, if the snow level is high, you need to prepare hunting skis in advance. Since skiing is not only faster, but also easier.

You need to go hunting as soon as possible after a snowfall. If it snowed at night, then morning is the most suitable time. The fact is that if you go out after lunch, you may simply not have time to find a trail and track down the “oblique” one, since the winter day is very short, and you need to walk long distances. Also, after a snowfall, as a rule, warm weather persists, contributing to the fact that the hare does not lie as sensitively as usual, and lets the hunter closer to him.

Trailing process

The search for "oblique" must begin with the places of its fattening. They feed near fruit trees, winter, and the remains of cereals in the fields. The fact that there was an animal at the place of the fattening will be evidenced by the many traces left in the snow.

When you have found such a place, you should go around it in a circle and find the exit point of the hare. This place will definitely be, since the animal never arranges a day in the feeding grounds. You need to follow the trail a little to the side, and do not trample the malik, since the hare, in order to confuse the tracks, can make a circle and return to its original place. In most cases, animals confuse trails in the following ways:

1. Makes loops on the snow of different sizes.
2. Can return to the trail several times and change its direction.
3. It may not return for a day in the footsteps of other hares.

In the process of trailing the "oblique" you may have situations when the hare's tracks intersect. There is a possibility of passage of two different individuals, but most likely, such a loop was performed by the same animal in order to confuse the tracks. If you find such loops, do not rush to switch to a new path, as the hare may make discounts (jump off to the side).

Loop crossing example

It is important to understand that the farther you are from the “oblique” fattening site, the more careful and cautious you should be. As mentioned above, you need to go a little to the side, as you may not notice the discount of the beast to the side. In the process of tracking, every hunter should know that during the day, the hare lies down with its muzzle in the direction from which the wind blows.

It is important to remember that the hare lies a little away from its path. If you follow the path and look only straight ahead, most likely you will not meet the “oblique” one.

Malik and his types

The success of hunting by tracking in the snow directly depends on how correctly you can read the tracks of the beast. Let's look at what the tracks are and what they can tell the hunter.

What do the tracks of a hare look like in the snow

Estimated or discount

These traces are distinguished by a large distance from each other and are located at a large angle to the original trace. As a rule, the hare leaves estimating traces before going to bed for a day, and their number ranges from 1 to 5. The key feature of the estimating traces can be considered that the prints of the front paws are together.

fatty

Fat traces can be called a pointer to the place of hare fattening. As a rule, there are many of them at the feeding place and they cover a certain territory. Fat tracks differ from the usual ones in that their paw prints are close to each other and often merge. It is from the place of detection of fatty traces that tracking on the animal begins in winter.

Racing

These traces indicate that the hare was scared away from the place of lying. Beginning hunters can easily confuse racing tracks with discount tracks, as they look almost like running tracks. The key differences are that their number is usually greater than 5, and the prints of the hare's front paws are much closer to the prints of the previous jump than the next. In other words, during the racing run, the animal throws its hind legs forward more strongly.

Where is the bed arranged

We already wrote above that when walking along the malik, you need to be extremely careful and look around, but what places should you pay special attention to? First of all, the animal seeks shelter near low shrubs, fallen trees of young spruces, etc. If there is no vegetation nearby where you can hide, the hare can simply lie down in the field. This will be evidenced by a small hill of snow.

If you find the beast, but did not have time to shoot or it just disappeared, you do not need to continue the pursuit, as the "scythe" can run several kilometers before lying down again. In this case, it is better to look for traces of another hare. When you fired a shot, but are not sure that you hit, you need to follow the trail for 10-20 minutes. If drops of blood are found on the trail, it is recommended to continue the pursuit. If no traces of blood were found in the snow, you can safely start looking for another animal. And at the end of the article, we invite you to watch a video of hunting for a hare in the footsteps.

Trailing hares is one of the most exciting and interesting, and besides, public winter hunts. It can be successful only when it is produced by powder, i.e. after fresh snow falls. On this hunt, the hunter, without any assistants and dogs, has the opportunity to fully test his powers of observation, develop dexterity, caution and patience, and also show knowledge of the habits of the beast.

The hare stays on the bed all day and only goes out to eat at night, i.e. to feed, so his entire path from the bed to the fat places and from the fat to the new bed is imprinted on the snow. This track is called a malik by hunters. The success of hunting by powder largely depends on the hunter's ability to recognize very diverse traces of a hare in the snow.

BY HARE MALIKS

In those places where hare and hare meet, it is very important to be able to distinguish their traces from one another. The hare's paws are comparatively wider and rounder, the fingers are spread apart quite widely, and therefore the footprint of the hare's paws in the snow will be almost round. In the hare, on the contrary, the paw is relatively narrower, the fingers are set close to each other, and therefore gives a more elongated oval footprint. In doubtful cases, examining hare droppings, which are often found on the malik, can help. In a hare, it has the shape of a slightly elongated ball the size of a hazelnut, and the litter of a hare appears as a flattened ball of light color.

Having risen with the onset of darkness, the hare goes to the place of fattening with its usual gait - short, even jumps, leaving the so-called trailing tracks in the snow. At the place of fattening, the hare moves slowly, leaving fat traces in the snow, which differ from the terminal ones in that the prints of the hare's paws are very close to each other, and individual traces almost merge. Fat traces often alternate with traces of a sitting hare.

Having devoured, the hare goes to lay, leaving all the same trailing traces in the snow. But before lying down for the day, he resorts to various tricks in order to throw off the trail of his many pursuers and enemies. First of all, it begins to wind, i.e., round off its path, making a full circle of a more or less correct outline and crossing its old track again. These loops are sometimes quite long. Not limited to one loop, the hare usually doubles or even builds (makes a “two” or “three”, as the hunters say) its track, that is, it passes the same track twice or thrice.

At the same time, the hare so carefully puts its paws on the trail that you need to have a very trained and sharp eye to immediately notice it. The length of the "twos" is very unstable and ranges from five to one and a half steps. The length of the "troika" is usually much shorter. The "two" usually ends with a discount (basting) - a huge jump to the side, made almost at right angles to the original track line. The number of discount jumps usually ranges from one to four, after which the hare returns to its usual gait.

In most cases, the hare is not limited to only one “triple” or “two” followed by a discount, but makes several twos in a row, each time breaking the trail with a discount jump. In most cases, the Russian makes no more than two or three "twos" in a row, although sometimes their number reaches seven or eight. After the “troika”, the hare almost never folds to the side, but continues to walk, and often for quite a long time, in the same direction. In general, it can be said that as far as the loops and “twos” serve as a sure sign that the hare is close to lying, so the “three” does not give almost any confidence in this.

Having eaten enough, the hare sometimes - especially on a bright, moonlit and frosty night - is not averse to frolic a little and play, running back and forth on fats. In this case, along with the usual end tracks, one can also see in the snow the so-called rutting tracks, which are given by a hare suddenly driven from its bed or in another way, strongly frightened, rapidly rushing.

Having run to its heart's content, the hare again takes up fattening or immediately goes to the bed, leaving again the same trailing tracks in the snow. After one or two loops, the hare usually doubles its track, throws itself off it to the side, then makes the “two” again, throws itself off again and, after walking a little more with the usual gait, soon lies down. It should be borne in mind that often the loops of a hare are not in front of the “twos”, but after them, that sometimes the hare does not take off from the “two”, but leaves with its usual gait, etc., so that there is a general alternation that is unchanged for all hares methods aimed at throwing the pursuers off the trail cannot be established.

At the beginning of winter, hares - both hare and white hare - fatten mainly on winter crops, leaving numerous maliki on and around greenery. Later, when deep snow falls and digging it up in order to get to delicious winters, it will become difficult for hares, white hare migrate to the forest, to forest mowing, where they feed on hay, tree bark, twigs, etc., and hare - to threshing floors, kitchen gardens, orchards or hillocks, from which snow is constantly blown away by the wind. In late winter, powder hunting can, in most cases, be carried out only on hare.

In deep snow, the white hare stays exclusively in the forest, where it is extremely difficult to sort out its always tangled tracks, and it is simply impossible to approach a hare for a shot and see it lying or running through a thicket of undergrowth littered with snow. And in general, hunting for white hares by powder is less interesting and prey than hunting for hare, since the hare malik is much more correct and constant, and these hares themselves keep, fatten and lie mainly in comparative proximity to housing and in open places.

Having found a hare malik, it is necessary, first of all, to determine the direction in which the hare went in order to follow the trail, and not the heel of the beast.

You need to follow the hare not by the very trace, so as not to trample it, but somewhat to the side. If the malik leads the hunter to the place where the hare is fattening, in order to avoid losing valuable time on a short winter day, one should not try to sort out the usually very tangled and intertwined fat traces, but go around them all the way to the exit trace of the hare from the fat places. In most cases, this trail will lead the hunter either to new fat places - and then the same technique should be repeated - or to the loops and "twos" of the hare, definitely indicating that its bed is somewhere nearby.

The encountered loop must always be twisted, no matter how large it may be. Otherwise, the hunter will often change the track of the pursued hare, already close to the hare, to the track of another, which crossed the first one and was mistaken for a hare loop. Only in the case when there is absolutely no doubt that the crossing track belongs to the same hare that the hunter is following, it is necessary, without wasting time circling the loop, to turn around with a new track.

However, only an experienced hunter can do this kind of confidence, and only if the grounds are poor in hares. Usually, the first loop is soon followed by the second. This is even more evidence of the proximity of the hare's bed. With the second and subsequent loops of the hare, you should do the same as with the first, that is, twist them.

LYOZHKA

The loops are usually followed by "twos" and sometimes "triples" of the hare. In the vast majority of cases, having thrown off after the "deuce", the hare lies somewhere not far away. There is no need to rush here, but on the contrary, having prepared for a shot, carefully look around, not ignoring a single bush, snow mark, boundary, stone and other irregularities in the snowy shroud, near which the hares love to lie down. In the forest, of course, you should pay attention to slightly different places - low Christmas trees, bushes, snowdrifts, marks at the roots of trees, etc.

Sometimes it is possible to examine a hare right on the bed and even get it lying down. With whites, this is extremely rare. Noticing where the hare lies - if the laying is not far away - it is necessary, without wasting time, to go to him and, when he jumps up, to shoot. If the lying position is far away, you should not go straight towards the hare, but somewhat to the side and, only approaching the hare for a sure shot, turn straight towards it. Approaching the hare, you should not look at it all the time, as this contributes to the premature jumping of the beast. In relatively open places, the hare in most cases lies with its head against the wind, and therefore it is also necessary to approach it against the wind.

In the event that it was not possible to accurately determine the place where the hare lay down from the “deuce”, it is necessary, leaving discount traces aside, to carefully and quietly walk around, having a gun at the ready and remembering that an excited hare often jumps up from a lying place quite unexpectedly for hunter and goes in full swing. In mild weather and deep snow, the hare usually lies very firmly, and it is not soon possible to pick it up even when you pass next to the hare. Therefore, having made one circle and not raising the hare and at the same time not finding its trail leaving the circle, you need to go again, but in a circle of smaller diameter, etc.

The place of the hare's bed is noticeable from afar, either along the hill of snow, which the animal threw in, digging a hole for itself, or along the dark hole of the hole. But it must be borne in mind that some hares are extremely picky in choosing their bed, and before choosing some place for it and settling down to rest, they rummage in many places.

If the snow is not deep, the hares most often lie down on uplifts, as well as among the bushes scattered across the field. In deep snow, hare beds are most often found near snow drifts along ruts, reservoirs, hollows, ravines, bushes among fields, near stacks of firewood, fences, hedges, gumens, sheds, etc. In deep snow, white hare almost always lies in strong places forests and only occasionally near stacks of forest mowing, and in early winter - through the bushes near the winter.

Often, a hare malik intersects with well-traveled roads. In this case, the hare very rarely crosses the road directly, but, on the contrary, having climbed onto it, it goes along it for some time in one direction or another, and only then, having made a “deuce”, it throws itself off to the side and continues on its way. The hunter must, first of all, find out in which direction the animal went along the road. With some experience, enough sharp vision and attention, this usually succeeds after a thorough inspection of the road.

The trail of a hare on the rolled snow of the road, of course, is not at all like the usual one, that is, on loose snow. The hare in this case will leave only traces of its claws, which are much more difficult to notice. If the tracks on the road cannot be found, then it is necessary to walk along the road three or four hundred steps in one direction, carefully looking around to see if there are any discount or ordinary hare tracks, and then - in case of failure - to the other.

Often a hare, especially a hare, takes off on the tracks of other hares. Only an experienced tracker-hunter can figure out this and many other tricks of a hare on the shoulder.