aging

The practice of determining how old a track or piece of sign is, based on its condition relative to known events — last rain, last frost, last wind, time of day. A track with sharp edges and moist soil was made recently. A track with a thin film of dust, dried edges, and a spider thread across it was not. Aging requires intimate knowledge of local weather, substrate behavior, and the small processes — drying, crumbling, insect activity, leaf fall — that erode a mark over time. The best trackers age sign not in days but in hours.