Thats it for the next few days. Today I leave to do the rounds of the relatives. My daughter is going to see a West End show in London, and Im taking my son to the Science Museum. I love wandering around with the kids, and London is a real treat for both of them.
So until after the New Year, I am signing off and look forward to seeing you on course in 2011.
Max

For those of you who missed my TV program for Animal Planet it is being screened again on the 2nd of January.
There are some good tips for tracking big cats in the UK. Building a hide and a method I use to  sign cut large areas on my own. Interestingly, there is footage of a big cat greeting a fox, nose to nose, however, part of this was edited out because of time constraints. Wildlife tracking can answer lots of questions.

I hope you all had a good  is in its festive period. Winters grip is here. The snow has started to melt and the vegetation is very thin.
 Mating time for animals will get ito full swing, so that the young can be born in the spring. In some areas the foxes have already started their eerie calls.
When Shadowhawk arrive in Poland to track wolves , the wolves will be mating.
This is a good time to prepare yourself for big cat sightings. In the next few months Shadowhawk will see a big increase in calls about sightings and kills. This is because its easier to see the animals, due to variations in their behaviour and later on training of young.

My fist TV program I filmed for Animal Planet is being repeated. Big Cat Track, which is a one hour program following tracking techniques I use in Africa to track lion, and leopard, and then apply the techniques to tracking the alien big cats, big cats in Britain, pumas, leopards, black panthers and other predators that are responsible for sightings, and livestock kills in the UK. It was fun filming and certainly adds weight to the case that big cats are roaming the UK.
It shows some good big cat evidence, some tracking techniques, and how to find the big cats.
Watch it if you can, and if you havnt done a course with me, give it a go.
December 27th 30

The conditions are shaping up nicely for the Shadowhawk expedition. We are going to be doing something that we have never done before. There is a location deep in the forset where when I did a couple of howls and the response was amazing. We had stimulated at least two wolfpacks to howl back. These are trully wildl wolves, and because of the howling response last year, we are going to take up positions on high ground at 6.00am. It will be freezing and very dark until 6.45am. This is the culmination of several years tracking the wolf packs in Poland, and this is our best chance yet of seeing them on the move.

With our wolf tracking in Poland just aroud the corner, it good to get an idea of what you could utilise from the forest to get a fire going and if needed get a signal fire on the go.
We will be tracking in an area is dominated by black alder, coniferous trees and the pioneering silver birch. As we track , you should never miss the chance to collect birch bark. You can either stash it somewhere, or as I do carry it in a pocket on my jacket.
Birch bark is ideal for fires, as it catches easy, even when wet, and burn with a high calorific value. It is ideal for lighting from a striker.

I have always believed that you need to carry your survival bits and bobs with you all the time. Its no good carrying the kit in rucksack, if you are going from camp with just a day sack, and strangely enough, some people think that carrying their survival kit in their day sack is sufficient. You would be amazed how many of those people( myself included) have gone out without a their day sack, in which their survival kit tin is packed.
So to make sure I have the essentials, I have everything I need, packed on my duty belt, and scabbard of my knife.
Bicycle inner tube, fishing trace line, fly hook( much more useful than just a hook), striker, whistle, orange or pink hi-viz tape, and bivvy chord.
I also carry a tin, which has bits and bobs and the usual contents of a survival tin. I will carry some things in there, that I know are on serious ration, if I have to use it, but will still use the tin to store needle and thead etc, which I will raid, even if not in a survival situation.
The addition to that tin include a teabag and one oxo cube...and for real I lived on an oxo cube for four days in the Chimanimani Mountains on the Zimbabwe/Mozambique border. Its an amazing survival food, it has got the knack of gving you a satisfying feeling if you lick it, or eat a crumb, or even better in hot water.
For Shadowhawk Poland trackers, you will need to carry your survival kit with you all the time, The temperatures are extreme, and with short daylight hours, youve got to plan to overnight  if you get lost.
I suppose thats enought for now, but watch out for a blog that will go into detail about how we can exploit  one of the boreal forests pioneer trees to aid in giving your postition to a rescue party.

Writing is not a skill that comes easy to me. Somehow, I can envisage what I want to say, and how to get it over, but the big problem happens when I come to type it up....some gremlin creeps in and it can go a bit haywire. If I dont get it right first time round, its really quite hard for me to correct it.  
Writing is a real struggle for me and  I would definitly prefer to play with a Mamba than write. I do sometimes get scared, and it looks like we are another stage down with a publisher taking up a tracking book.
 The publishing industry, is a tough one, with tough people working in it.
The recent chapter I did was several thousand words, and reading back wasnt easy, I have known for a few years that my eyesight has been dwindling, but now, I know for sure that Im off to Specsavers....

The snow is lying deep in Poland for our wolf tracking expedition. Now that weve tracking at our feet sorted, we need to practice  casting our eyes out and bringing them back to near your feet. The best way to do this is to cast your eyes out to the horizon and bring them back to  just ahead of yourself( About your body length). As you cast your eyes out to the horizon, bring them back, but practice by doing a verbal commentry.
Once youve practiced this for a bit, we will bolt something onto the technique, that is essential.
Because we are going to a trully remote area in Poland, where getting lost in forest is easy, we are going to talk about survival in the next few weeks.  Tracking and survival go hand in hand, but we do have to be extra carefull, being out in such cold temperatures.

,Got a chapter of the book off to the publisher, just in time, thanks for all the support, which was over-whelming
I am doing a talk at the Outdoors Show in London, and as yet I havnt finalised a subject. I thought I might give this a whirl, and see if there is anything that you would like to hear about.
By the way there are some tracking skills to practice, coming up on this blog in a couple of days