Ramblings and Such From Hunting Coyote
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nicholasjohn
Well-Known Member
Another point that hit home a while back was that most of the time I had thought I was the teacher, it dawned on me a few days later that I was actually the student. The feeling I would get when I finally figured out that I had been taught a lesson is probably what made the lesson stick.
In 1981 I was still really wet behind the ears when it came to coyote ( and still learning to this day) . An older trapper and den hunter called me to see if I wanted to go look for pair that were killing .I jumped at the chance . We met at his shop in the morning got our stuff loaded in his jeep then headed out for the ranch . We started at the pasture with the lamb killing going on in it to start our tracking and sign reading . A walk around the water hole told me they were coming to drink from the north west for water . Walking some of the draws in that direction showed they were hitting one draw going and coming into the lambs . Several more draws walked out told us they were now moving more westerly . We stopped for our lunch while we were eating Merlin ask me so where is it that you think the den is . I told him in that rough stuff to the west in the next pasture . He then ask how is it you come to think that . My reply was that's what their tracks say even when they move on different trails they are coming and going in that direction . We went into that pasture about an 1/8 mile there on a south facing cut bank standing out like a sore thumb was the den . The pups had been out playing and had the grass mashed down around the hole for a radius of at least 10 feet . The old pair was traveling 3 miles to the lambs one way and eating only the soft parts , lungs , liver and stomach full of milk to take back to the pups . We looked the area over and figured that the adults might be in a draw to the north about 30 feet away . Using a Criter call standard Merlin let out some puppy squeaks . The old male popped out of the draw in front of me with anger showing in his yellow eyes . I shot him we then took 8 pups out of the den with barbed wire . I got experience , Merlin got 500 dollars , the rancher stopped loosing lambs I think we were all happy except maybe the female coyote .
Dsheetz, you ol potlicker......thanks........very interesting story....I moved to Mondamtana in 1983.... I love reading sign and all the challenges it represents. There is an old lion hunter here in Modamtana named Walt Earl, he has a book called "The White Pages", quite witty, you have sign in the snow, you can tell everything that went on, even the mind set the lion (or coyote) may be in...........GOD gives you gifts to use. A brain and some eyes
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ReemtyJ , we just need to learn to use what we have been given . They have gotten dulled by our life styles unless we work to keep them sharp just as a good knife needs worked on to keep it sharp . I will look up that book it won't be long before the wind and snow are blowing . I enjoy a good read and coffee then .
So Dsheetz, lays out the bait..............................any takers 
swing batter, batter, swing....
swing batter, batter, swing....When I first started working for this ranch doing predator control in 1986 they had me go out to locate for the helicopter . One of the ranchers and I went out one morning to locate . I started with a long lone howl waited a few minutes and did it again . I was glassing when up on top of a ridge I saw 4 coyote just setting looking our way . We got on the radio and contacted the chopper it headed in and when it got there the coyote got up and ran off of the ridge to the north into a long draw . The chopper didn't get any of them so then the chopper pilot was asking if I had really saw them but the rancher had also saw them . I went around to the head of the draw to the north and coming out of it on a trail was their tracks heading into a sage brush flat . I ask if maybe the next time the chopper could come in from the north . The answer was well I always come in from the way I did today . OK that's what I thought . So then a few days later they call me up and tell me they flew that morning and got four out of that pasture . Really how did you come in I ask from the north . A long pause then we did and they had to run down the draw into that long open flat bottomed draw with the high walls they couldn't get out of . We all need to change our approach to things at times .
nicholasjohn
Well-Known Member
We are creatures of habit, DSheetz. Why do we do it this way ? Because we've always done it that way - it's our procedure. Does it always work for us ? Well, no - not always. Sometimes we need to do it differently, because the surrounding circumstances have changed, or some outside variable dictates a need for a different approach. When you put the bug in the pilot's ear to come in from the north, he promptly blew it off. Once it became his idea, though, it seemed like a good idea - and he tried it. You were looking at the big picture. He was tuck in a rut, doing it the way he had always done it - even when it didn't work. The fact that you didn't say "I told you so" probably did a lot to cement in the lesson he learned that day. It may have opened his mind to a whole new way of operating.
It helped him and the other ranchers in the long run as he then started doing the other ranches he flew using a different flying pattern and his numbers picked up . Much the same as ours do if we don't get into the habit of using the same calls, lures , trap sets and locations . I killed an old dog coyote with an M-44 once . I had seen his and two females tracks twice running the same stretch of road so I set it up . I put the m-44 up next to some cactus just close enough that he wouldn't roll on it but not so close that he would get into the cactus . He pulled it and I had him but for the rest of the year the females would cut off the road before they got to that area then return to the road after they had passed it . I have seen more then once where they would avoid an area that one of their partners had died or gotten into trouble .
nicholasjohn
Well-Known Member
Yes - unlike people, they learn pretty quick.
DMP25-06
Well-Known Member
ReemtyJ , Loved your reference to baseball :
"So , DSheetz lays out the bait................... any takers , Swing batter , batter swing ."
Hello again to all of you " RAMBLERS " who have participated-in , and followed this MOST INFORMATIVE , and ENJOYABLE thread with frequent trips down MEMORY LANE ( at least for me ) .
I am sorry to have been out of the exchange of stories and information for the past 2 months , but , I have been in-disposed , and I will not bore you with the details .
Referencing back to my story about trying to tackle and capture a live whitetail deer . My Dad and Grandfather ( Pop ) would take me , my brothers , and any and all neighborhood kids that wanted to go along on our yearly trip to the Colorado River each Labor Day weekend to hunt Doves , Squirrels , and Rabbits ., and fish . The trip was always 3 days and 2 nights.
This was over a period of 8 years .
2 adults and anywhere from 4 to 8 boys , all riding in a Ford F-100 pickup truck for a trip distance of 165 miles from home .
We slept in a tent or on the ground , under the stars .
As I said before , we were from the poor side of town , and most of the neighborhood kids had no money , some had a shotgun that usually belonged to their father or uncle , but my Dad would pay for everything , ammunition included , even though he had to save and rat-hole money all year ( Dad had a service station from 1959 - 1967 ) to make this trip happen for the kids . If we didn't have enough shotguns or .22's , we paired-off and shared our guns , alternating with each other between shots .
Pop ran the camp and cooked all of the meals for all of the boys ,( a huge pot of doves , squirrels , rabbits , and dumplings , as well as a big pot of pinto beans , and anything else that we might shoot ) as well as teaching several of the boys the value of respect and honesty .
Pop passed-away in May , 1968 at he age of 66 . Many of my young friends attended his funeral .
Dad passed-away in December , 2009 at the age of 81. Nearly all of my friends attended his funeral service , and the guest book has over 500 signatures from people attending .
Both Pop and Dad were Wonderful MEN .
"So , DSheetz lays out the bait................... any takers , Swing batter , batter swing ."
Hello again to all of you " RAMBLERS " who have participated-in , and followed this MOST INFORMATIVE , and ENJOYABLE thread with frequent trips down MEMORY LANE ( at least for me ) .
I am sorry to have been out of the exchange of stories and information for the past 2 months , but , I have been in-disposed , and I will not bore you with the details .
Referencing back to my story about trying to tackle and capture a live whitetail deer . My Dad and Grandfather ( Pop ) would take me , my brothers , and any and all neighborhood kids that wanted to go along on our yearly trip to the Colorado River each Labor Day weekend to hunt Doves , Squirrels , and Rabbits ., and fish . The trip was always 3 days and 2 nights.
This was over a period of 8 years .
2 adults and anywhere from 4 to 8 boys , all riding in a Ford F-100 pickup truck for a trip distance of 165 miles from home .
We slept in a tent or on the ground , under the stars .
As I said before , we were from the poor side of town , and most of the neighborhood kids had no money , some had a shotgun that usually belonged to their father or uncle , but my Dad would pay for everything , ammunition included , even though he had to save and rat-hole money all year ( Dad had a service station from 1959 - 1967 ) to make this trip happen for the kids . If we didn't have enough shotguns or .22's , we paired-off and shared our guns , alternating with each other between shots .
Pop ran the camp and cooked all of the meals for all of the boys ,( a huge pot of doves , squirrels , rabbits , and dumplings , as well as a big pot of pinto beans , and anything else that we might shoot ) as well as teaching several of the boys the value of respect and honesty .
Pop passed-away in May , 1968 at he age of 66 . Many of my young friends attended his funeral .
Dad passed-away in December , 2009 at the age of 81. Nearly all of my friends attended his funeral service , and the guest book has over 500 signatures from people attending .
Both Pop and Dad were Wonderful MEN .
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