- [Coyote] Any body of water is going to be
the best place to find animal tracks.
(mellow melodic music)
- [Mario] What are these?
I don't know what tracks these are.
- Hold on a second, here we go, I think I got something.
Yes!
- I don't know what this is,
these tracks are really intriguing.
They look like dinosaur tracks,
but of course, that's not possible,
at least I don't think it's possible.
(dynamic jungle music)
(birds twittering)
- What's going on, Coyote Pack?
It is a beautiful autumn day here in Columbus, Ohio
and we are at one of my favorite metro parks, Prairie Oaks.
Mario, do you remember the last time we were here?
- [Mario] I definitely do
and I was wearing a lot more layers, 'cause it was freezing.
I definitely appreciate this temperature today.
- We made a video called "Winter Wilderness," a buddy film,
so I figured why not make a buddy film sequel,
where we head back out into the environment
to look for mammals.
But what's unique about today
is we're debuting the Brave Wilderness
North American Mammals Adventure Kit.
- Alright, what's in it?
- Of course, you wanna know what's inside the box, right?
So my favorite mammal is the wolverine
and I always wanted a wolverine figurine as a kid,
so there you have it. - Nice.
- [Coyote] Absolutely love this guy.
- Oh, man!
- Beautiful, right? - That is really accurate.
- Absolutely, now give me back that toy.
So what else is cool about this kit
is it has an Animal Track Plaster Kit.
- Wow, I've actually never used one of these.
- You've never done this before?
- No, I have not, so that's a legit plaster kit.
- It is. - Wow!
- So what I was thinking we would today
is head back out into the environment
and see who can find the coolest mammal tracks
and then make plaster casts of them.
Now we should rank these tracks on three different levels.
- Okay.
- I think uniqueness of species found,
the quality of the actual print
as it lies naturally within the environment
and then last, but not least,
the quality of the cast you pull.
- [Mario] Okay, sounds good, is there a prize at the end?
- How about the winner gets to take home the toy wolverine.
- Nice. - Not yet, though,
first you've got to find those tracks.
Let's give ourselves 30 minutes,
you think we can find tracks and pour that cast
within 30 minutes? - I think so,
I think I'm a good tracker. - Okay, cool.
You have a GoPro, I'll have a GoPro,
let's split up and may the best animal tracker win.
- Searching for tracks is something
that requires your full attention.
- In most instances I consider animal tracking an art form,
it can be very difficult to find mammals in the wild.
What I'm on right here is actually a game trail,
so I followed this a ways and it heads downhill
and it looks like toward a river.
Now any body of water is going to be the best place
to find animal tracks, where the ground is softer,
that's where the animals are gonna leave their impression.
- [Mario] So this is not necessarily
going to get some prints that well,
it's a little too dry, too hard of a surface.
- Ah, look at this, my first tracks,
those are deer tracks right there, definitely the hoof
from likely a pretty good sized white-tailed deer,
now you may look at a track like this
and say okay, is this the perfect spot to start your cast?
Not really, a lot of this substrate is very sandy,
full of tiny little pebbles,
so getting a good impression of that track
is not gonna be possible.
- Not sure how Coyote is doing,
but I've got around 15 minutes left,
before we have to meet back,
so I've got to really step it up here.
I'll go in that direction.
- Now this kind of substrate is absolutely perfect,
look at this, these deer tracks here
are in good, firm clay.
Now these would be the perfect tracks for me to cast,
except a white-tailed deer
is about the most common animal in this area
and I don't think I'm gonna win the contest
by casting tracks of deer.
(mellow melodic music)
- [Mario] What are these?
Look at these tracks.
- So I moved further inland from the river
hoping that eventually I will find
a different body of water, maybe a swamp, maybe a pond.
Everything's just so dry right now.
This is looking promising up here though, look at this.
Yes, yes!
This is my first and most definitive sign,
this right there is coyote poop
(quirky melodic music)
and from the smell of it, it's fresh.
Now you may be saying to yourself,
Coyote, how can you look at animal scat
and determine that it's from a coyote?
Well, there are no large canine in this area like wolves,
this is too big to be a fox
and there are a bunch of little hairs
and berries also in it.
As to which direction this coyote traveled, I'm not sure,
but with the river just ahead of us here,
I think I'll go back down to the embankment
and see if it went there for a drink.
Okay, coyote poop, we are hot and on the stinky track.
- This is definitely not a mammal,
I don't know what tracks these are.
Huh!
(quirky melodic music)
They look very birdlike,
I'm not sure what species this is.
There's one, two, three, four,
then it kind of disappears here in the long grass,
which of course would make sense,
if you're an animal, you're gonna hide in this vegetation.
- Okay, we've got a down slope over here,
ooh, and it looks like a muddy embankment,
okay, let's check this out.
This is the best mud I've seen all day.
Look at this, there's more mud
than there is sand and rocks.
(melodic haunting music)
No tracks yet though.
- Well, I don't know what this is,
these tracks are really intriguing,
they look like dinosaur tracks,
but of course that's not possible,
at least I don't think it's possible.
- Hold on a second, here we go, I think I've got something.
Yes, yes, yes, yes!
We've got coyote tracks, wow!
Okay, that's a coyote track, that's a coyote track,
that right there is a great coyote track, yes!
Okay, I've found some tracks in pretty solid mud
and with only about three minutes to spare,
which means I need to quickly set up my plaster kit
and pour that plaster to pull a track,
not exactly the rarest animal in this area,
but at this point, I'll take anything I can get.
Now before I cast my track, actually something that I'll do
is just use a small piece of wood like this,
which is an old tree branch, it's very flat, very smooth
to actually flatten out the earth around the track
to make as perfect of a cast as I can.
I don't know if Mario is aware of this prep work.
- Alright, so here is the kit,
(light melodic music)
most important is the instructions.
- Mixing ratio, two fluid ounces of water
for every half cup of plaster mix.
So in the kit is a little mixing dish just like this
and a track ring,
now you wanna place this ring around the track,
so you can pour the plaster on to the inside.
- Now the next step is to actually mix the plaster.
(quirky melodic music)
Knife with ya?
Coyote's got my knife.
- [Coyote] And now I am going to slowly start
pouring that into my mixing container.
I'm gonna only put about a quarter of the bag in to start.
- Gonna put about, I'm just gonna put all of it actually.
Now next step is to add some water,
I'm not sure how to measure out two fluid ounces,
'cause we don't have a measuring device,
I'm just gonna eyeball it.
- [Coyote] You don't want the plaster to be too thin
and you don't want it to be too thick.
Now we also provide you with a stirring stick
and you want this to have the consistency of thick glue,
so right now it is way, way, way too watery,
so what I'm gonna do is start to add more plaster powder.
- [Mario] This needs more water.
- [Coyote] Oh, this is cool!
Alright, now we're getting somewhere.
- This is getting messy, really messy.
- [Coyote] This will start to set within just minutes,
so you want to move quickly
once you start your mixing process.
- Alright, next step is to pour it in.
- [Coyote] This is that magic moment
and you only get one shot at it,
so make sure the plaster is the perfect consistency.
- [Mario] Ooh!
- I always like to start in the front paw pads.
Okay, now the track is completely covered,
but to make sure that it's all down and in,
you don't have any air pockets,
I like to use my stir stick to just work the plaster
round a little bit and into the track.
- Okay, a little bit more water in here, oh!
That's too much water.
It's a lot harder than it looks, guys,
it's my first time doing this.
- [Coyote] You wanna pace it out
as you're adding more plaster,
you don't wanna dump it all on in one fell swoop,
otherwise it won't dry properly.
Take your time, be patient and with any luck
you'll have a perfect animal print cast.
- Alright, well, there you have it, that's my attempt
at making a plaster mold of an animal track.
- [Coyote] Okay, my track is completely cast,
so at this point, we just need to wait for about two hours,
we'll come back and check 'em and then identify the species.
- [Mario] Okay, sounds good.
- Okay, let's go get some lunch.
(quirky melodic music)
Okay,
it has been about two and a half hours,
since we set our plaster.
- Yeah.
- And at this point, it should be dry.
- I'm a little nervous. - Why?
- Because I don't know if mine set properly,
I don't know if I followed the right directions.
- Well, in all fairness, - I don't know.
- it is your first time
and that's what's cool about this experience
and for a lot of people out there watching,
it will be their first time at doing a cast of a track,
but with any luck, they'll be fantastic,
so let's head back down this way into the wilderness,
find our tracks and see if they set.
- [Mario] Alright.
(cheerful melodic music)
- Check this out, what do you think those are?
- Wow!
I have no idea.
I mean, my initial instinct would be a turkey,
but the toes aren't long enough.
- No. - I mean, I don't know,
I'm gonna say you're pulling a fast one on me,
but let's check your plaster
and see how that is going to take.
- Okay, so--
- Now just almost like a sandcastle, flip that over,
let's see what we have underneath.
- Oh! - Wow, okay.
I'm gonna give you some credit here, it's looking good.
Pour a little bit of water on there.
Wow, that is cool! - Dude!
It looks like a dinosaur print.
- That looks exactly like a dinosaur footprint!
Are you kidding me?
That is a great cast right there,
so you see what happened though is there's a lot of sand
now permanently worked into your cast,
you're never gonna get all of that out of there.
So let's take this down to the river,
- Okay. - rinse it off
the rest of the way and then we'll go check my track.
- [Mario] Alright.
- Let's see here.
Okay, so my ring, - Oh, will come off.
- will completely come off,
because I didn't put the plaster all the way to the edges.
Now here's the tricky part,
because that ground is so wet,
- [Mario] Oh, that's pretty solid.
- I don't want the cast to break as I'm bringing it up,
so I'm gonna use this stick to dig out around the track
and pry it up, there we go, just like that
and the entire structure of the earth comes up with it.
Now inside there should be a perfect coyote track.
Oh, it's looking good, this is gonna be great.
Let's get these outer edges peeled away.
Now the next thing I wanna do is rinse it off in the river
and see just how perfect it looks.
Now when it comes to washing out your cast,
one thing you can use is just an old toothbrush
to gently finesse out any of the remaining mud and dirt.
Okay and there it is, a perfectly cast coyote track,
you can see the toe pads, the heel pad
and even some claw marks.
Now this was your first time out there
casting animal tracks in the wild,
what did you think, how difficult was this?
- Well, I wasn't that confident initially,
because of the mess I made, but after,
the way my cast actually turned out, it's super easy,
if I can do it, you can definitely do it as well.
- Now remember, guys, the Brave Wilderness Adventure Kit,
North American Mammals Edition is available right now
and when it comes to who won the wolverine figurine,
I think it's a tough call,
I honestly thought that I was gonna win
just because I knew what I was doing,
but your track with its uniqueness
and that's a really good cast for a first timer.
- Thank you. - It's tough to tell,
so what I say we do is leave it up to the Coyote Pack.
- Okay. - Who's gonna win, guys,
is it Coyote with the coyote track
or Mario with the mystery animal track,
write in the comments section below
and tell us who's gonna win the wolverine figurine.
I'm Coyote Peterson. - I'm Mario Aldecoa.
- Be brave. - Stay wild,
- We'll see you on the next adventure.
- Alright. - Awesome, let's hike back.
(mellow melodic music)
If you're looking for a great place
to go out and see animals,
or signs of them in the natural environment,
the parks in your area are a sure bet.
Winter is coming, so make sure to get outside
and enjoy the last warm days of the year.
If you can't find any animal tracks naturally,
like Mario, using one of your favorite toys to create them
is a totally acceptable solution.
Hey, Coyote Pack,
if you enjoyed our adventure into the autumn wilderness,
make sure to go back and watch our original buddy film,
"Winter Wilderness," a classic,
where Mario and I found a feather and a deer antler.
Yep, it's a real thriller and don't forget,
subscribe and click the Notification bell,
so you can join me and the crew on our next wild adventure.
- Yep, look at that! - Oh yeah, wow, look at that!
100%, oh wow!
That is definitely a little mouse tunnel, isn't it?
- Nice, so basically the rodents are underneath the snow,
they've got these little highways that they create
to stay warm and stay hidden from predators, pretty cool.
(light jungle music)