Coyotes

I shot a coyote with my bow last night as I was getting ready to climb down out of my treestand. No camera, no pics . It’s the first I’ve seen all here, anyone else been seeing any critters?

Boods, Last Sat night I experienced something for the first time. First early in the eve I have 2 does come from across the field near wide open, they get under my tree, stop and look back. I thought, what spooked them? Then about a minute later there he is at the field edge so I start squeeking with my mouth trying to get him to continue my way. He had something else on his mind as he hangs a right anf goes back into the woods where I here turkeys starting to putt and then a few take flight. I don’t think he succeeded. Then things settlte down and 45 min later he’s lightly howling in the woods behenid me so I cut him off and howled back. That’s when things got nuts because the whole woods erupted in coyotes yipping and whatever else they do, then it got quiet until dark. Then I hear alot of animals walking, leaves russling, twigs snapping and so forth. I shine my flashlite when I here comotion on the field in front of me and see about 5 sets of eyes, then they retreat back to the woods so I grab me can call and repeatedly flip it and here they come. It sounded like an army comming through the woods and I have no idea how many but they seemed to be comming from every direction. I got one in my flashlight beam and trying to hold my flashlight between my fingers and draw my bow and trying to find him in my sights I let her fly and can only guess I missed him by inches. Man these guys were on a mission and after hearing the way the whole pack surrounded me, I have no doubt these guys could take down a healthy deer with ease. After that I pulled my camera card only to find a big black bear. I’m not even sure even sure I want to hunt this property again!

Boods- We hunt them all winter long with hounds. Tons of fun chasing them around. In some areas we call them. Still fun, but not as exciting.

Coopertop- Really don’t have to worry about the yotes. yes they will cause a few less deer in the area, but mostly the young, and sick. Very hard for them to take a healthy deer down. They don’t have the power of a wolf. Even in a large pack will stay away from humans. They only time I have seen them stick around is on a downed deer. had them running all around me as I tracked one last year. it was a little unnerving, but nothing came of it. Sure they they cleaned up the gut pile quick. Still I had my eyes open the whole time.

Steve White

I lost a bow kill to coyotes last year. My hunting area is covered in coyotes and I learned the hard way that I can’t leave a deer out overnight and recover it in the morning. I shot one right at dark and didn’t hear it fall, so I backed out and went in the next morning. The deer looked like a winterkill after about 9 hours. The exposed half was completely gone. There was hair and bones scattered everywhere. They are very efficient scavengers.

Our gutpiles seem to dissappear faster now, too. They used to lay for about 4-5 days, but now they are gone the next morning. Sometimes, a deer that gets shot in the morning will have coyotes on the gutpile by noon.

I now carry a cordless spotlight and if I shoot one at dusk, I’ll wait about 30 minutes and then get the spotlight and start tracking. I’m not losing another one to those (expletive) dogs.

Coppertop, that sounds like an eventful night. I would have been doing this when I seen those sets of eyes …haha

Great stories guys!

We also run them with hounds here in SE MN. We’ve been training pups and excersing the adults all summer. So as soon as the corns is out, the yotes are in trouble.

I went out to my stand lastnight and found a yote had beat me to it! I was almost in range before he busted me.

Coyotes today are NOT afraid of humans in the least bit. There have been more and more reports of coyote’s attacking humans or their pets right in their front yard. We blame much of this on the liberal folk who voted to ban trapping in a few of the western and west coast states. Anyway, I have a pretty crazy story about coyotes and deer hunting as well.
A few years ago when I still hunted deer down along the Wisconsin River, I had an encounter I will never forget.
Early in the morning, I was making my way in the pitch black to my treestand. As I was walking, I kept thinking I heard something. But since I am 3/4 deaf and not particularly found of the dark, I put it off as my imagination. As I finally approached my treestand and started to put on my safety strap, I heard the sounds again, something was running right near me. Then, the quiet stillness erupted in a coyote howling intensely close. I know I turned as white as baby powder and the hair on the back of my neck was standing straight out. As the chills raced down my back, I hauled up to the stand. Then I could hear quite a few more animals making a beeline right toward my stand. I quickly got out my flashlight and was scanning all around me trying to figure out what was going on. A very short time later and not too far away, I could hear leaves getting thrashed around and a lot of growling, yipping, and whines. The sounds of all the commotion in the dark was scary as hell. I assumed a coyote pack had made a kill and I just happened to be in the area at the right time.

Watts you need to come down to Iowa for a weekend some time. I just talked to my neighbor who owns the back 40 by my place. He has lost 2 calves and a cow to yotes this year and wants them all dead. The pack leader is a half bred german shepherd yote mix. I went out to feed my horses early in the morning on monday and the cocky son was standing with a few from his pack right next to the pasture.
I am getting worried that if we have another cold winter the pack will be running my horses and chickens. It is time to thin out the pack.

That half breed is an extremely dangeous animal to have around. You need to get rid of it ASAP!!

I know, that SOB has been running my horses. It is time to take him out but I don’t have any visability on him until he is right up on you. As soon as the corn comes out I am hoping to lay him down. I have never been afraid of coyotes until this guy. The next property line belongs to the girlscouts. Their manager wazs telling me that this halfbread had been coming into their camp sites so they had to stop doing trail rides and whatnot.

Where in Iowa are you at? Me and a friend do a fair amount of coyote hunting. We would consider heading down that way if the fees are not to high for an out of state hunter.