Weird request....how to make fake animal scat.

[Mmathis]

OK, I know this if off the wall..... Last week I worked as volunteer staff at a Cub Scout camp -- I took Tiger Cub Scouts (1st graders) on little short, mini hikes [ 7 groups, back-to-back ]. The absolute highlight of the day for these Cubs was the fact that there was some actual scat left on the trail. You know little boys and poop!

Well, there is no guarantee that we'll be that lucky this Saturday, so I thought I could make some "faux scat." Does anyone have suggestions for a "recipe" for various types of animal poop that would foil a 1st grader? So far, the only idea I've come up with is Crayola Model Magic [similar to Play Dough], that I could color [it does come in colors, but want to be able to vary the color] and form into various scat-shapes. For coyote scat, maybe mix in some cat hair [we have more than enough!].

We know there are deer, coyotes, armadillos, beavers, raccoons.......and I would like to make at least 2 types. Suggestions for convincing ingredients?

Last year I went out a day early and made animal tracks using colored mortar mix. They fooled about 90% of the kiddos, and it made their day!

 

[peter hillman]

I was going to say play-do. You're on the right track, with the added ingredients you need to add texture. I don't suppose rabbit scat would much interest for a scout team.

 

[Meyer Jordan]

But how do you duplicate the smell?

 

[Bullfrog]

I have a really large friend that could accompany you and you could say that it was a Bigfoot.

Of course you know I mean the footprints....

 

[snoozer]

Tracks you may be able to pull of but poop is more of a challenge. I think the best would be the real thing. At summer camp this year, one of the other troop leaders and I went hiking and found a huge pile of bear scat. Well, you can't leave a treasure like that just sitting in the woods so we managed to roll it onto a large piece of birch bark and took it back for the kids to see. Put it on a stump outside of the site with a sign next to it and asked them to guess what it came from. One of the new guys came up and told us we were the best leaders because we could find such cool stuff. just a thought, a strange thought but what the heck.

 

[Mmathis]

Thanks, all, for suggestions and ideas!

But how do you duplicate the smell?

Well, you got me, there, but I really doubt (hope) that they'll notice. And if they say anything, I'm always good at making things up, like: it's old poop so it doesn't smell as bad. Or I could always stop by the health food store and buy some stinky oil (just kidding). The scat we found last w/end didn't smell.....not that I noticed, and the kiddos didn't say anything, so......

I was going to say play-do. You're on the right track, with the added ingredients you need to add texture. I don't suppose rabbit scat would much interest for a scout team.

Anything would interest them! Don't rabbits make those little pellets? Maybe too small, but worth a try. The scat could tell the story of the circle of life. Rabbit sees coyote, which scares the s_ _ t out of it. Coyote eats rabbit. Coyote returns rabbit to the environment.

@snoozer Last year I found a decomposing armadillo carcass near our campsite. It got wrapped in a trash bag and transported to the hiking trail. That was kinda cool. A lot of the kiddos had never seen an armadillo, dead or alive. Bear scat would be the BEST, but we don't have bear in our immediate area. I'm afraid if I pulled that one off, these kiddos would be frightened to think there were bears that close to the camp -- or their younger siblings would be. These are Tigers....

I found some Play-Dough (my Model Magic had dried out) in my crafts stash. Mixed it really good with cat hair and acrylic paint. Also baked some small white pieces of polymer clay, shaped to look like tiny bone pieces and/or tiny teeth. Those got mixed in, as well. It's drying. A little darker than I wanted, and the "shapes" aren't the best.... I even smashed down one section and volunteered one of the cats to make a print, LOL! Not really accurate, but going for visual effect! (I hadn't made the print yet when pic was taken).

 

[snoozer]

That's awsome poop! if you have alot of hair in it it would look like coyote poop.

 

[addy1]

Gather a bunch of seeds more seeds than poo and you have ground hog poo

Little pellets for rabbit, big pellets for deer

 

[snoozer]

another poop you could make is porcupine. More saw dust than poop.

 

[Mmathis]

That's awsome poop! if you have alot of hair in it it would look like coyote poop.

Oh, it's FULL of hair -- we have 5 cats and one is a long hair, LOL!

Gather a bunch of seeds more seeds than poo and you have ground hog poo

Little pellets for rabbit, big pellets for deer

No ground hogs here -- but there are wild hogs (the pig kind). I think I'm going to try for deer. Lots of those around the scout reservation so no matter how bad it turns out, should still be believable.

another poop you could make is porcupine. More saw dust than poop.

We don't have porcupines this far south -- that "wood" be a neat one to try. We have beavers.... Do they consume wood or just chew it?

 

[Nepen]

hmm... a few years ago in my in-laws property in the mountain, I found left over bones... probably got eaten by bear or coyote or fox. But I think it's so cool then we guessed what type of bone that was. Dont know how to make fake bone like that but just an idea for something other than track and poop!!

 

[Mmathis]

hmm... a few years ago in my in-laws property in the mountain, I found left over bones... probably got eaten by bear or coyote or fox. But I think it's so cool then we guessed what type of bone that was. Dont know how to make fake bone like that but just an idea for something other than track and poop!!

Actually, that idea was suggested to me, and I think I know how to pull it off -- just don't know if I I have time. "Bones" would be easy to make with polymer clay, and they don't have to be perfect or even a complete skeleton. Thanks, @Nepen!

 

[sissy]

oh geeze we are now making poop .Have you checked the internet or you tube also

 

[Mmathis]

oh geeze we are now making poop .Have you checked the internet or you tube also

Not this time for You Tube. I just wanted quick & easy w/out having to wade through videos. Have been Googling various types of scat for ideas. These are 1st graders -- and this stuff only has to last through about 2.5 hrs of little kid scrutiny, LOL!

 

[peter hillman]

But it's like Santa, they gotta believe!