Perhaps I missed something, but I tried to track earlier tonight with my lvl 1 ranger, and I got a message that said "only rangers and druids of a specific level can track."

Is there now a required ranger level to track?

As noted here, rangers currently get their tracking ability at level two. It has been this way for some time now.

I see.

Well I guess it was a bug that I had that ability for about 1 week that last time that I played (about 2 weeks ago). Come to think of it, I know someone who had a rog6/rgr1 a while back (2 months ago) and he tracked all of the time. Or maybe this was a more recent change?

It doesn't make much difference to me, but I was surprised that I had it and now it is gone.

It was likely made that way so that people who take ranger for the free dual wield feats would not recieve the meat of the ranger profession, that being tracking.

Vlaid It was likely made that way so that people who take ranger for the free dual wield feats would not recieve the meat of the ranger profession, that being tracking.

Yeah, and I don't disagree with that.

Apparently in PnP rangers also don't get tracking until lvl 2. I was just confused as to why I did have it for a while, and then it disappeared. I guess I shouldn't have ever had it.

It got changed around the time that the ranger improvements went in (speed bonus, etc). So, before that, characters with one ranger level would have been able to track.