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Ok so first up lets look at a nice obvious track trap ( A nice soft patch of sand, mud or other substrate that will take and hold tracks well) where the tracks are plain to see, fairly quickly I would expect you to be looking for harder ground where the tracks aren't so obvious.Your stick comes into its own only when the tracks become a little more vague. Often on man tracks my mentors words will ring in my ears "Use the force..." oops no I mean "Trust your stick.."
Track trap found look for a series of nice obvious tracks or make some of your own by walking at a steady pace across a patch. With tracks found or laid its time to get up close and find your feet (OK bad pun but I couldn't resist)
Place the tip of your stick next to the heel of the second print, and roll your first ring on your stick to mark the distance to the toe of the first print.
Now you have a gauge for your subjects stride. With that marked you can now position the stick with the First ring up to the toe of either of the prints and position a second ring level with the heel of the same print, to register the size of your subjects foot.
Ok that's the measuring done. Some may use another ring to gauge the width of the shoe
but for the most part these two rings will be your guides.
Now to use the stick to find the next print its a simple task of placing your first ring on the toe of your last print and using that as a pivotal point draw out an arc in the estimated direction of travel, if your subject was keeping a steady pace the tip of your stick should point to the area where you are most likely to find your next heel print. once you have found the next print you keep leap frogging along in this manner for as long as you like.
If your struggling to find a toe or heel mark you can use the rings on the stick to gauge your subjects foot size and estimate where you should be looking to find the other end of the foot.
With practice and experience this technique will speed up the times when tracking is slowed to a step by step method, until your back onto more obvious tracks that can be followed at a faster pace.
Written by: Dave Roderick.
