Original subtitles

We will be heading out

to explore a place that I consider my childhood

backyard, The Holden Arboretum.

Established in 1931, this wild place spans

3,600 acres in Northeastern Ohio,

and is home to a wide variety of plants and animals.

When I was a kid, I spent my summers searching this location

for frogs, snakes, and turtles.

So today, I will be taking a trip down memory lane,

as I lead members of the Coyote Pack around the grounds

to search for wildlife.

So if I put up these ears, if I give

the signal to you guys like this,

it means I've seen something. Everybody would be--

- How about this? - Oh, I guess that works too.

You want to do that?

Oh, that kind of looks a little bit more like--

Looks like a coyote.

I like that.

That's so smart! What's your name?

- Rigsby. - Rigsby?

Mhm.

Rigsby decided that this is going to be the Coyote symbol.

I like it.

Here, give me like a coyote--

boop!

OK, so this will be the Coyote symbol today, which means,

be quiet, something's been seen.

And that's "be quiet" in like everybody be quiet

so we can catch an animal. Sound good?

- Yeah. - Yeah.

Let's sneak up, then. You guys got your maps?

Yeah.

Coyote, what are we doing?

I don't want to hold my map anymore.

All right, so right now, we are sneaking up

on the Lotus Pond, which is our first spot

where we're going to actually start looking for animals.

Everybody's excited.

Now, there are snapping turtles, snakes,

and frogs that live here.

It's just a matter of can we catch one.

I just stepped in goose poop!

I just stepped in poo!

I see a big bull frog right there.

Where?

Stay back.

You guys want to try and get that frog?

Yeah.

Oh!

- Did you get it? - Oh!

Oh!

- Got him. - He's just a little guy.

Whoa!

Oh, I almost slipped on the rock.

OK, let's bring him back here into the shade a little bit.

The good news is we have caught our first animal.

But he's just a little tiny frog, right?

We want to see a really big bullfrog, don't we?

That's the bad news,

What, that it's a little tiny one?

Well, all frogs are pretty much created equal.

And he is pretty cute, isn't he?

Yeah.

So you guys know what kind of frog this is?

Bullfrog!

A bullfrog. That's right.

That's a good little one.

It's nice to see these little tiny frogs like this,

because it means the ecosystem is incredibly healthy,

and the tadpoles are turning into frogs.

Now, a frog of this size, he's got a lot of predators

out there.

You guys know what would eat a frog like this?

Snapping turtles.

Snapping turtle. Not a coyote, right?

- How about a snake? - Not me.

A snake could eat a frog like this, yep.

And he's probably thinking to himself right now, uh oh,

look at all these Coyote Pack members.

You wouldn't eat this frog, would you?

You want to pat him?

Just real gently on his back right there.

No? - I want to pet him.

You want to pet him?

I want to pet him too.

Just real gently.

I want to pet him.

OK, the back.

There you go.

Now, frogs are totally safe to catch and pet.

All right, well, hopefully we'll catch a bigger one,

but this is a good start.

So far, we are one-for-one.

Watch how he swims off.

You guys ready?

Yeah.

One, two, three.

Bye, buddy.

Boop!

Hey, there he is!

Did he swim down and hide in the leaves?

- Yeah. - Yep, I saw him.

All right.

Well, we caught a frog.

- Should we go back? - Let's call it a day!

Well, this is the part where somebody

should give you a high five. - Oh, yeah!

Who wants a high five?

Boom, boom, boom, boom!

High fives all the way around!

High fives, high fives.

All right, let's go find something a little crazy.

Yeah.

He got something.

Whoa!

He got him!

Painted turtle!

Sometimes you just end up in the right place

at the right time.

That's a pretty good sized midland painted turtle right

there.

And this time of day, the turtles

are just basking up on top of these weed beds

absorbing light.

And I see the back of the carapace

here, all of that space right there is kind

of like a solar panel, right?

They're relying on the sun to heat them up so

that they can go out and hunt.

This turtle does have some algae on its shell.

Oftentimes, you don't see painted turtles

with algae on the shells because they spend so

much time basking in the sun.

The sun kills the algae, and then their shell

is usually very smooth.

But you, for some reason, because you probably

live in this real mucky area, have gotten a lot of algae

on you.

What do you guys want to name this one?

- I know. - What?

- Picasso. - Picasso.

Because he's a painted turtle.

Oh, OK.

You guys want to go with Picasso?

- Yeah. - Yeah.

Every once in a while, you got to give one to Mario,

otherwise he'll cry.

That's the only one, Mario.

All right, you guys ready to let Picasso go?

Yeah!

All right, Mark, you got your shots?

I did.

All right, I'm going to just put Picasso out here in the--

I want to get that snapping turtle.

Shh!

I see a snapping turtle.

Certainly do.

OK.

It's 100% a snapping turtle on the far side of the pond.

You guys can't see it from here.

It's by those green plants.

Man.

Catchable?

Yeah, definitely is.

It's faced-- it's faced in the wrong--

I mean, there's no way to make a play

on it when it's up like that.

So we're going to ignore it for the moment,

but we are going to go around this side.

The good thing about where it's positioned

is we're not going to disturb it on that side,

and there's no people walking over there.

So right here by these rocks, there

are a lot of water snakes, so that's going

to be our immediate target.

Now, good news is that I see a snapping turtle.

There's potential for snapping turtles

all throughout this pond.

There's about four of them that live in here.

The good news is that we see one, right?

You do not see a snapping turtle.

I do see a snapping turtle.

100% see a snapping turtle.

What I'm going to do is have you guys wait right here.

Mario's going to go with me.

And I'm going to sneak up right by these rocks

here and see if I can get us a water snake.

Coyote, there's a hawk.

That's a turkey vulture.

Ah!

Ah!

All right, everybody stay back, everybody stay back.

Ah!

He's biting me!

Oh, gee!

Yes, he did!

Now, everybody--

Stay back.

- this is dangerous, so we're not going to pet this one.

It's very feisty.

As you can see, I'm already bleeding.

That is a northern water snake.

You don't normally want to jump on rocks to catch snakes.

But today, we definitely need to see the animals, right?

And that didn't take me long, did it?

Now, let me teach you guys a little something

about water snakes.

They bite, right?

Now, notice the pattern of this snake.

The pattern is very distinct.

You see that?

See that speckled patterning?

That kind of looks like a water moccasin, kind

of looks like a copperhead.

People oftentimes misidentify the northern water

snake for one of those venomous species.

However, this is non-venomous, but they do bite.

Now, why am I bleeding as much as I am?

It's not because they have big teeth.

It's because they have an anticoagulant in their saliva.

Has anybody ever heard that term, "anticoagulant?"

Basically, it causes you to bleed a lot,

and the blood doesn't clot, so it

doesn't kind of stop bleeding.

So this is just going to keep dripping.

You see that, Mark?

Ew.

Yeah, and you know what else he's doing?

Ugh! Oof!

Musking.

No biting, no biting.

He's also musking. Oh.

Oh!

Oh, he tried to get you there.

A little close to the camera.

All right, you guys ready to put the snake back--

oh, he's trying to get my nose.

You guys ready to get the snake back out in the wild?

- Yeah. - Yeah, he is bitey.

All right, here we go.

I'm going to let him go right back where he came from.

All right, I'm going to set him down.

Bye, buddy.

All right, so, Coyote, what are we doing?

All right, we're scanning this edge for snapping turtles.

It's dark and shady right here, so it's really

tough to see into the water.

These geese are moving out, which is good.

It means it won't scare the snapping turtle

once we get over there.

If the geese are acting natural, it

means that the environment is natural,

and hopefully we can land a dragon.

Everybody hang out here in the shade.

Where is he?

The snapping turtle's off this edge here.

I think he went deeper, but I'm going to sneak up on this edge

just to see if I see something.

I'm going to move all along the edge of this.

So you guys stay here with Mark.

Or, Mark, are you coming with me?

I'm coming with you. - OK, Mark's coming with me.

Everybody stay right here.

Snapper right there.

Yup.

You got him?

Ah!

Yeah!

Got one!

Oh, that's ol' Noseless right there.

Man, he almost slipped out of my hands.

He is so slimy.

Ah!

Woo!

Now, before anybody gets any closer,

I'm going to set it down for a second.

Yeah, we got one, right?

Let's not get bitten by it, especially me.

Now, this is Noseless.

I don't know if you can see from there,

but he doesn't have a nose.

Something happened to him early on in life.

Probably fighting with another turtle.

But as you can see, they're very, very snappy, right?

So you see where Mark is?

You guys can get to about where Mark is.

Don't anybody get any closer, because the turtle's

head is facing that direction.

OK, right there.

Good, good, good, good.

Perfect.

Awesome, guys.

Now, we can pet the snapping turtle.

At the very end, I will turn it backwards.

And one at a time, we can come up and pet its tail, OK?

Now, Noseless is one of the most consistent common snapping

turtles that I have caught here at the Holden Arboretum.

Always seems to be hunting around the edges of Heath Pond.

And I still think you're incredibly handsome even

though you don't have a nose because it makes you

very, very unique looking and it makes

you very easy to identify.

Now-- can we-- just for like two seconds, can we be calm?

Everybody's here.

They want to see you.

You know we go through this once a year, once a year.

See, he's smiling for you guys, but he

would really like to bite me.

So this is a common snapping turtle of about average size.

For me to catch a turtle of this size,

I'm really excited about it.

But what would be even more exciting

is a super enormous turtle.

But this looks pretty big to you guys, right?

- Yeah. - That's a pretty big turtle.

Now, can we think of any predators for a snapping turtle

of this size?

What would you eat a turtle of this size?

What do you think?

Maybe an alligator or something.

- Oh, come on. - Maybe.

But there's no alligator snapping turtles around here.

The honest answer is only humans.

Did you guys know that people make turtle soup sometimes?

Ugh!

No turtle soup for you.

No soup for you, buddy.

Don't worry about it.

You're totally good.

A turtle of this size really doesn't have any predators.

Now, when they're smaller, baby common snapping turtles

are just a little bit bigger than that.

So a turtle of that size can be eaten

by a bird, or a larger turtle, or a snake,

or even like a largemouth bass.

You guys know a bass, all right?

Yeah!

All right, Mark, can you kind of see his tail from there?

Yep.

All right, let me kind of turn it like that.

You guys see that dragon-looking tail?

Yeah.

I have to keep a good eye on the front end.

Now, one thing that I love about these turtles' tails

is I'm going to kind of really delicately--

OK, no nose-- Noseless.

Hey, buddy.

I'm going to let go with that hand.

Don't you try to spin and bite me.

We're going to look at your tail.

Check out those ridges.

These are osteoderms, which are pieces of bone covered

in skin, scale, and, at this point,

some really gnarly looking algae.

Look at that.

Looks just like the tail of a dragon.

Let's look at the plastron of this snapping turtle.

We're bringing him up.

Take a good look at that, guys.

OK, there we go.

I see you, bud. I see you.

I see you.

OK, there we go.

All right, you see that?

Now, the plastron of the common snapping turtle

is much smaller than other turtle species.

And that's why they have evolved to have

this very gnarled skin, sharp claws, and that powerful bite.

Woo!

All right, hold on one second, guys.

Let's get a little wrap-up here, and then everybody

can pet Noseless' tail.

How's that sound?

Well, I would definitely say that that

was one epic adventure.

We caught all sorts of creatures and in the end,

landed one enormous common snapping turtle.

I'm Coyote Peterson.

Be brave.

Stay wild!

We'll see you on the next adventure.

You guys ready to let this turtle go?

Yeah!

All right!

Say, thanks, Noseless!

Thanks, Noseless!

Bye bye, Noseless.

Bye, Noseless.

What I've got in my hands here is a baby American alligator.

To my left, a pretty angry adult.

Now, this baby doesn't belong to the adult

that you see here next to me, but it's actually

a rescue from the pet trade.

You hear that?

Yeah, I'm a little closer than you

probably want to be to a seven-foot American alligator.

Now, you may see these babies in your local pet store

and think to yourself, wow, that would make one cool pet.

But I'll tell you what, in just a couple of years,

you're going to have this guy living in your basement.

He's going to lunge.

You hear that hissing?

I'm really close to his gator hole right now.

And he's basically saying, back off

and get your little baby out of here too.

Whoa!

Woo!

Did you guys get that?

Yeah.

Wow.

Yeah, he's basically saying, this is my turf, Coyote.

You better just keep on moving.

These baby alligators may start off small and cute,

but you probably want to stick to something more traditional,

like a hamster.

So one question I oftentimes get is, does

Coyote Peterson have any pets.

Earlier this year, I introduced you

guys to my dog, Charlie Bear.

She's a rambunctious Rhodesian Ridgeback

mixed with a Greyhound.

And I also have a sulcata tortoise

named Green Bean Sherman.

However, I do have four temporary pets.

A few baby common snapping turtles.

Now, a number of years ago when we were out on the road

doing the "Brave Adventures" book tour,

I said to a couple of different audiences

when they would ask if I have pets, yes.

I have four turtles that I actually

rescued from a weird sort of lagoon that

was around a swimming pool, so they must have hatched

and went into this area that was not exactly conducive for baby

snapping turtles.

So we rescued them, and those four turtles

have now grown over the course of the past two years

into mini dragons.

These two are just the first two that are big enough

to head off into the wild.

And let me introduce you to Rock and Atlas,

two of my baby dragons.

Hi, guys.

How are you doing?

Are you excited?

I know.

Right now, they are thinking to themselves, wait a minute,

I'm not inside my terrarium.

I hear birds.

I hear running water.

I can smell the swamp.

I want to get out there and hunt.

And don't worry, guys, in just a few minutes,

we are going to release you into this protected

wildlife sanctuary.

Now, I'm going to put one of the turtles

back down into this little tank.

Let's just take a look for a second

at a baby snapping turtle.

You guys are used to seeing me catch enormous mud dragons,

turtles that way between 20 and 50 pounds.

And these guys are tiny.

But you will notice that the design of a baby snapping

turtle is almost identical to its bigger

brothers and sisters.

Of course, you have the carapace,

which is the top of the shell.

And then, the plastron, which is the bottom of the shell,

and which is much lighter in coloration on a baby turtle.

But then, you've got that head and that neck.

Look at that big, long neck stretch out.

And now, are you developing some aggressive tendencies yet?

Let's see.

You're going to bite?

No, not yet.

Sometimes they do try to bite me,

and that's exactly what I want to see,

the turtle taking on its natural behaviors

even when in captivity.

Now, you may be asking yourself, well,

Coyote, if you've had these turtles in captivity

for a couple of years, how will they

know how to go out and hunt?

Snapping turtles never lose their instincts

for being reptiles.

So as soon as these turtles are into the environment,

they're immediately going to start hunting,

and they're immediately going to start thriving.

Now, these turtles are two years of age, but keep in mind,

when a snapping turtle hatches, it's only about this big.

That's pretty much bite-size, so anything that comes across it

is going to take the opportunity for a quick meal.

Now, Rock and Atlas have definitely

reached the size where they are ready to head

back off into the environment.

These are voracious predators at two years of age,

but there are still predators out

there for turtles of this size.

mink, raccoons, even fox will take advantage if they

come across a turtle like this.

Now, where we're releasing them is very close to where

they hatched out.

The environment is covered in duck weed.

It's got thick mud, plenty of lily pad cover.

And with any luck, these turtles are

going to have an easy time staying hidden and out

of the way of danger.

So you guys stay safe.

I'll be thinking about you often.

We'll always go back and look at your little baby photos

because, in a way, they're kind of like my children.

I'm sad to see them go, but I'm very happy to know that they

now have a better chance at eventually growing

into the monster-sized mud dragons

that we're constantly searching for.

I'm Coyote Peterson.

Be brave.

Stay wild.

We'll see you on the next location.

All right, guys, it's time to head off into the swamp.

All right, well, the baby snapping turtles

are officially off and into the wild.

And with any luck, they are going

to thrive here in this protected body of water.

Ah, I feel like a parent watching

his kids go off to college.

It was a good day.

Right now, we are on location at the Costa Rican Amphibian

Research Center, one of our favorite places

to film in Central America.

This location is actually home to a number

of different unique plant species, many of which

are not even native to Costa Rica.

And I just came across a tree that I think you guys

definitely want to check out.

I posted a picture on Instagram recently of its fruit,

saying, do you guys know what this is, and whether you do

or don't, do you want me to eat it?

They're super strange looking.

I've never tried them.

I figured we'd save it for a video.

This right behind me here is the salak palm.

And actually, its scientific name, salacca zalacca

makes complete sense, I guess.

Trent, I'm going to hand this camera off to you

and we're going to take a closer look at this very unique tree.

Now, like I said, they are not native to Costa Rica.

These can be found on several islands in Indonesia,

but the habitat here is absolutely perfect

for these trees to thrive.

This one is actually a female.

There's a male here right behind us.

And one thing that you may not know

is that only the female trees actually have fruit,

and the fruit is right there.

I think we all know what those look like.

Ripe figs.

But they're not figs.

They're actually more commonly known as snake fruit.

And sometimes, this tree is called the snake fruit palm.

Now, you'll look at these leaves that all grow right down

into the base of the tree, and the first thing

you're going to notice as you reach in for one

of these delicious round-looking fruits

is that these leaves are protected with these really

long, sharp, and rigid spines.

This thing is booby-trapped.

If you want to come in and get a quick snack,

you'd better be careful.

Because if you slam your hand into that, trust me,

it's going to be a very unpleasant afternoon.

Now, when it comes to getting the fruit,

I'm going to just use my knife here to gently cut one of these

away.

Now, there's some small ones here.

These ones I read are not going to be ripe.

The bigger the fruit, the more likely

the chances of it being ripe.

So actually, there's one that's right off of the tree

right there.

I'm going to take another one of these big ones right

from the back.

All right, check those out.

Big fuzzy fruits.

And the reason these are called snake

fruit is because the outer skin resembles

the scales of a snake.

And they also have these really sharp spiky hairs on them.

Can you hear that?

They're very, very sharp.

And it makes it very difficult to get into the fruit

if you're an animal.

However, if you're human and you have opposable thumbs,

all you need to do is pop off a little tip just like that

and you can begin to peel back that rigid, spiky skin.

Now, these actually kind of resemble mamon chinos.

We've done a video on those in the past.

I know a lot of you called out, no, coyote, those are rambutan.

Well, in Costa Rica, guys, they call mamon chinos.

There we go.

Skin comes off, and there is the fruit.

It almost looks like cloves of garlic.

Now, inside the fruit, there can be two or three pieces.

And you can split it apart into two unique halves like that.

And on the inside, there is an inedible seed,

which means you don't want to eat that seed,

but let's go ahead and give this a try.

It's the first time I am ever tasting snake fruit.

It doesn't really smell like anything.

Maybe actually a little bit like a potato.

Hmm!

Oh, kind of sweet and then it gets really bitter.

Wow.

That is sharp.

And the texture is kind of like something

between a dehydrated apple and a piece of potato.

It's really not bad, though.

And the more you chew it, the juicier it gets.

But what I'm finding is that as the juice squeezes out of it,

the fruit actually kind of dries out your mouth.

It's kind of really starchy.

Kind of gross, but there's what the fruit's like chewed up.

Kind of looks like a mushy paste of potato or dehydrated apple.

And once you get down to the seed, all you got to do

is discard that and go on to the next fruit.

Now, I probably wouldn't eat a ton of these in a row,

but if you happen to find yourself out in the wild

and you come across a snake fruit tree

and you want a quick snack, as long as you can get past all

these spiny booby traps, you're pretty

good to get one of these fruits and enjoy

a quick natural treat.

Of all the things I've eaten on the "Brave Wilderness"

channel, at the end, I usually end up puking.

Definitely going to be no throwing up

after eating the snake fruit.

This is quite delicious.

Mm!

There you have it.

Oh, I dropped it.

A little wilderness snack here on the "Brave Wilderness"

channel.

Hopefully you guys enjoyed this behind-the-scenes episode.

Now, it's time to go out and find some animals.

I'm Coyote Peterson.

Be brave.

Stay wild.

We'll see you on the next location.