The Paw Print Puzzle
Muddy paw prints cross the porch every night. Is it the dog, the neighbor's cat or a raccoon? Priya and her brother look at the clues.
Every morning that week, there were muddy paw prints across the back porch. They went from the flower bed, past the bench, to the dog flap in the back door.
"It's Rufus," said Dad, frowning at the family dog. Rufus thumped his tail and looked innocent.
"We don't know that," said Priya. "It could be Mrs. Fischer's cat, Pepper. Or a raccoon. Mr. Ellis said he saw one by the bins."
Her brother Dev, who was six, got out his magnifying glass. "Let's solve it," he said.
Priya fetched the animal track book from the shelf. They knelt beside the prints, careful not to step on them.
"First clue," said Priya, reading. "Raccoon prints look like tiny hands, with five long toes."
Dev counted the toes on the nearest print. "One, two, three, four. Only four toes."
"So probably not a raccoon," said Priya, writing it in her notebook. "That leaves Pepper or Rufus."
She turned the page. "Second clue. Cats can pull their claws in when they walk, so cat prints usually don't show claw marks. Dog claws stay out, so dog prints usually show little dots at the front of each toe."
Dev put his magnifying glass right down to the print. "There are dots!" he said. "Four little claw dots!"
"And look at the size," said Priya. She laid a pencil next to a print. "This is way bigger than Pepper's paws. Pepper is tiny."
They looked at each other. Then they looked at Rufus, who had suddenly become very interested in a spot on the wall.
"But why does he go out at night?" said Dev. "He sleeps in the kitchen."
That night, they set up a trap. Not a real trap: a flour trap. Priya sprinkled a thin layer of flour on the floor just inside the dog flap. Then everyone went to bed.
In the morning, there was a trail of floury footprints, going out through the flap and coming back in. And next to the flower bed, there was a hole. In the hole was Dad's missing slipper, two tennis balls and a very old bone.
"Rufus!" said Dad. "You've been burying treasure!"
Rufus wagged so hard his whole back end wiggled.
Dad laughed and fixed a latch on the dog flap so it locked at night. Priya and Dev made Rufus his own digging spot in the corner of the garden, with a sign that said Rufus's Treasure Pit.
"Case closed," said Dev, and he gave Rufus one of the tennis balls back. Rufus buried it immediately.
⭐ The End ⭐
💬 Talk about it
- How many toes do raccoon prints show?
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Five. - Why don't cat prints usually show claw marks?
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Cats pull their claws in when they walk. - What did they sprinkle by the dog flap?
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Flour. - What did Rufus bury in the hole?
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A slipper, two tennis balls and an old bone.
