Last two weeks, I have had some good coyote hunting, December 1st was my first hunt this fall, hunted a break along a river property. Called in 4 coyote at 500 yards, but they wouldn’t come any closer. Bad cover (had absolutley no cover).
Second set walked about 5 minutes down a road to where I was going to setup to make my second call set, saw a big big badger hunting in tall grass, I know from experience coyotes follow badgers while they hunt to cleanup escaping mice. The coyote saw me but didn't seem to worried, it walked up on the road in front of me about 160 yards away. It trotted along the road till it hit about 200 years and was starting to drop of the road edge into a little draw. It was "now or never" so I shot standing in the middle of the road.
After getting that coyote, walked a 1/4 mile and set up along a fence. Put the call out about 40 feet from a corner post rock pile. Played a rabbit call 12-15 minutes when a pheasant came flying over from the East ridge which told me most likely a coyote was coming. Sure enough less than a minute later, a coyote came running over the East ridge where the pheasant came from. It came right to the mojo critter decoy and the call. It stayed there, while twice I tried to shot my AR. It even looked at me twice while I cycled through shots to get a shot. Dang touchy AR, so I grab my shotgun and got it as it started to run away (love uneducated yotes).
December 2nd hunted the same property in the morning, saw a coyote out on the fields about 600 yars away. Once I started calling it ran away. Gave up because saw no takers.
December 8th stopped on an upcoming corner which looked over a valley to the East. Used a rabbit call probably 10 minutes when I saw some deer run out of a draw on my left which told me a possible coyote was coming. Sure enough 1-2 minutes later it appeared below me coming out of the draw on the left. Having come in from the left put the coyote in a hard to shot area from where I was sitting, so I decide not to shot. I didn’t want to negativity educate this coyote with calls and gun fire. Shut the call off and hoped he would hunt around. He didn't he crossed where the deer did and went into the wood where they disappeared.
Drove another 1.5 miles and did another call with a distressed bird call. No action.
Drove another couple miles to what I thought was a hot spot from a prior year. It wasn’t the right spot (needed to go another mile), I followed the road by foot for a couple hundred yards, saw several track in the snow. Setup on what I thought was a reasonable spot and used a rodent call. No takers. While I was putting my stuff away in the truck, I heard coyote calling further down the road from where I had setup. So I grabbed my gear and went up above where I called. There was a big open field. Stayed along the timber line to the North-East side. Setup against a couple big Padarosa pines. Used a female howl. I spotted 2 coyotes coming in from the SW. I was setup down wind of my call (more NW). The lead coyote came running straight at me while looking at the call area (which was to the left). Probably when it 15-20 feet away, I lifted my shotgun the coyote start running away but only went 50-60 feet away, I woofed a couple times and it started to come back. It was looking straight at me but couldn’t really tell what I was. Lined up my shotgun and tagged it, but it keep running. The other yote verde off to East and was way to far out of range for my shotgun. I got up and tracked down my coyote, it probably went probably a 100 yards. Nice male yote.
Went another 5 miles to what I thought was a good spot but in hind-sight the close range opening had a lot of hidden spots as well as a lot of thick timber beyond 60 yards. Used the same female howl. After 15 minutes, I had at least 2 coyote out about 100-200 yards to the West in the trees. I could see them running around in the openings between groups of trees. I switched to a pup distress call and a coyote to the SW started to charge in. I had my gun ready for it to hit the opening and literally at that moment a truck drove by behind me and the coyotes took off (argh!!!).
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