Years ago I was snowshoeing down the middle of a small river in Northern Minnesota. It was early in the morning and the snow was deep with a fresh layer on top. The only sign of life was the track of three coyotes that were traveling one behind the other, also in the middle of the river.
Because of the recent snow fall I knew the tracks were only a few hours old. As I followed their trail I could see that they were not wasting any time and no doubt were heading for a favorite safe spot to spend the day.
The river was about forty feet wide with high wooded banks on each side. The river was winding so it was difficult for me to see ahead very far. I never did see the coyotes.
After following the coyote tracks for some distance I noticed one of them left the others and made a sudden sharp left turn then stopped after about twenty feet, but still a few feet from the bank. The other coyote tracks continued on without change. I turned aside and followed the single track.
The snow was flat and undisturbed from one side of the river to the other. The coyote had stopped and dug a hole down into the snow for about a foot, then continued on back to the main trail and fell in behind the first two coyotes.
Curiously, I dug down into the bottom of the hole and found an empty beer bottle. When I held it up to the light I could see something inside. When I looked down through the open end I saw a dead field mouse.
The mouse had squeezed into the open bottle because it had traction in the snow. However, when it tried to get back out of the bottle it had no traction on the smooth glass and found itself trapped, and died.
The amazing part was the coyote smelled the dead mouse from at least twenty feet away, in a bottle, and buried under a foot of snow.
It thought it was a great demonstration of a coyote’s sense of smell.
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