Some wives have limited sense of humor

[ivarhusa]

It is a little after 5am, oh-dark-hundred, and I took my e-caller out to the front porch and let out a group howl.  I wanted to see if I could get a response from the wild neighborhood that lurks beyond the golf course. Well, after about 5 seconds of howl, my wife comes out and orders me to stop. ("Yes, ma'm.") She didn't think our neighbors would want to be bothered at this hour with such loud noises. (I didn't get a response from that brief call.) No sense of humor, I say.

I did a bit of hunting/scouting yesterday, driving mostly but getting four stands in. One area where I'd seen and heard coyotes in previous visits has be newly posted No Hunting, so that is sad.  On the brighter side, I found a new area with cattle and shrub steppe that looked very promising.  I got nothing to my call, but as I was driving away (from about a half-mile) I heard a pack singing in the direction I had been just calling (beyond).  So, there is hope to call them in there, if I am sharp enough. Shown below.

[rasbo]

sounds like your having fun with it,LOL

[tlbradford]

Doing just what you did is how you will end up with 90% of your stands.  The great thing is, once you dial in the coyotes preferred areas, is that even as you keep killing them off, new ones will take their place.  Good areas will always hold coyotes, year after year, as long as no disasters befall the area (disease, fire, etc.)  When I hunted seriously and would kill a breeding pair.  I would make sure to call that area again within a couple of days.  More times than not, a new pair had moved into that territory.  Nice job Ivar.  Now just formulate a plan on how you can get closer to the coyotes you heard, and you will be set.

[ivarhusa]

My technique for selecting stand locations so far a bit of by guess and by golly.  I hope expect that hunting with Jerry Malbeck this winter will school me a bit (as much as I can absorb). So far, when I come to likely holding area, I get far enough away form my vehicle that it isn't a factor (visible to approaching critters) and not so far 'in' as to be exposing myself to critters while enroute to a perhaps 'better' spot.  I tend to 'call my way in'. Call at a site, move 1/4 to 1/2 mile and call again.

It isn't really working for me, and I am not sure why.     There must be other factors to learn about.

Here's one of the spots I 'lost' to No Hunting signage (as I didn't see the signs until on my way out). Nothing to hide behind, here!


Ivar

[Dan-o]

Cool pics.

My wife has a pretty darn good sense of humor.

Opening of deer hunting my partner and I were walking up a closed road at O Dark Thirty.   Probably 5:30 AM and we got into a disagreement about whether we were in a 3-point or better unit or an any buck unit.    He mentioned calling his wife but thought better of it.

I called my wife, woke her up and assured her nothing terrrible had happened and then asked her to go check the regs for us.    She did, and then she laughed and went back to bed.  Got to love a woman like that.

P.S.  The confusion originated because we were hunting aunit that was 3-pt for Mule deer, and buck for white tails.

[JackOfAllTrades]

Nothing to hide behind, here!

All kinds of stuff to hide behind!  Power poles. The grass clumps that are tall. Every draw is a hiding place. Just don't silloett/skyline on the top.  Hell, put your MoJo right in front of you on the top of a hill.

-Steve

[tlbradford]

Nothing to hide behind, here!

All kinds of stuff to hide behind!  Power poles. The grass clumps that are tall. Every draw is a hiding place. Just don't silloett/skyline on the top.  Hell, put your MoJo right in front of you on the top of a hill.

-Steve

Actually that is a downside to using decoys.  You have to expose yourself to put them in a spot that the coyotes can see.  Be very careful in using decoys, not to expose yourself.  I tend to put them in the bottom of the areas so it draws the attention away from you when the coyote is close.  You aren't using a decoy to bring the coyotes in, you are using your calls for that.  Decoys should be used to help you get away with movement when a coyote is in gun range. 

I agree though, plenty of places to hide, and plenty of draws to hide your movement into stands.

[fair-chase]

Try silently approaching your stand instead of calling your way in. Drawing attention to yourself while traveling is a bad idea.

Try and go a little farther between stands. 1/4 to 1/2 mile is not that far in open country depending on how loud your calling is. Might try to go a full mile in between stands.

[ivarhusa]

Try silently approaching your stand instead of calling your way in.

I may have conveyed the wrong impression about my travel.  I would sneak into my first calling location as quietly as possible. I'd call for 30 minutes or so. Then I would move silently (well, as silently as I can) to the next stand. I typically don't have space to hunt as large as would permit me to move a whole mile to the next stand. Well, I could do it once, maybe, but then I come out the other end!

I feel very exposed when I crest a ridgeline.  Everything newly in view to me, is also able to "see me" too. I have yet to see a coyote lounging/hunting on a far hill that hasn't seen me first, despite my best efforts.  I cling to the idea that my calling reaches into places that I can't see into, that may be holding a coyote not yet aware of my presence.  I really struggle with the balance between seeing and being seen as I set up a calling site. I have had coyotes spot me coming over a rise (skylined, of course) before I've had much more visible than my head and chest- and that from a critter a measured 400 yards away.  It is eerie how keen coyotes are at spotting trouble.  I stumbled onto some pups earlier this year, at less than 100 yards, but that has been the sole exception.

I have been reading pieces by successful hunters who write of diligently glassing distant slopes to see coyotes before they see the hunter.  That sounds good, but I fret over the movement of binocs giving away my position to that coyote I haven't spotted yet.  They could pop up close by (100 yds or less) and I might have been glassing.

So much to think about.