Coyote hunting for beginners

I just got permission from a few farmers to hunt some coyotes in southern MN. The only problem is I’ve never been coyote hunting before and I’ve got a few questions. Any help would be appreciated.

1. The land is about half hilly woods with a river running through it. It is surrounded by open farm land. We hunt it for deer in the fall so we’ve got some stands scattered on the edges of the woods/farm land and some near the river. Where is the best place to set up? Is it worth it to set up in the thicker stuff or should I be set up overlooking the open fields?

2. I have an 870 with a bird barrel and an old Lee Enfield rifle chambered to .303 British. Buckshot is best for the shotgun, right? Should I run a full choke or modified? Is the .303 British too big of a round for coyotes?

3. Calls, calls, calls. I’ve been looking at the calls and there are a ton of them out there. I’ve been calling ducks and geese for a long time so I’m confident that I’ll be able to learn how to use the predator calls pretty easily. The only problem is that I don’t know which ones to get. Does anyone have any recommendations on which types of calls or even specific brands? I don’t have the money to buy an electronic call right now, so I’m stuck with doing it the old fashioned way.

4. Scents: Do I use a scent blocker? Are there attactant scents that work better than others?

Thanks for any help you can give. I’ll post pics next week if I’m successful.

Welcome to IDO Ihprop1! We have some great members on here that I’m sure can give you some excellent advise to your questions!

Thanks. I migrated over here from the IDOFishing side of things. I hope to hunt a lot more in the coming years than I’ve been able to the last few.

Welcome to the dark side. A load for shot gun I have played with a little bit is the Hevi-Shot Dead Coyote. These rounds run around 50 .20 cal Pellets, and hold a pretty good pattern I know Hevi-Shot also makes some tight choke tubes. With these shells, and a tight tube shots out to 70-80 yards should be achievable. As for the rifle if you just looking to thin them out that will do it I don’t think their hides are worth much this time of year, from what I have been told that could be wrong though. I’ll post a think to the info I know there is cheaper routs as well but have seen what these can do.

For scent watch the wind and stay scent free them darn things are smart. I cant help much for calling we use a E Caller. Hope this helps you a little bit, and good luck to you

http://www.cabelas.com/product/Shooting/Ammunition/Shotgun-Ammunition%7C/pc/104792580/c/104691780/sc/104567580/Hevi-Shot174-34Dead-Coyote34-Ammunition/706224.uts?destination=%2Fcatalog%2Fbrowse%2Fshooting-ammunition-shotgun-ammunition%2Fhevi-shot%2F_%2FN-1100191%2B1000005765%2FNe-1000005765%2FNs-CATEGORY_SEQ_104567580%3FWTz_l%3DSBC%253BMMcat104792580%253Bcat104691780%26WTz_st%3DGuidedNav%26WTz_stype%3DGNU&WTz_l=SBC%3BMMcat104792580%3Bcat104691780%3Bcat104567580

http://www.cabelas.com/product/Hevi-Shot174-Hevi-13174-Turkey-Choke-Tubes/708740.uts?Ntk=AllProducts&searchPath=%2Fcatalog%2Fsearch.cmd%3Fform_state%3DsearchForm%26N%3D0%26fsch%3Dtrue%26Ntk%3DAllProducts%26Ntt%3Dchoke%2Btubes%26WTz_l%3DHeader%253BSearch-All%2BProducts%26x%3D11%26y%3D13&Ntt=choke+tubes&WTz_l=Header%3BSearch-All+Products

I’m a bit rushed on time, so I’ll try to come back to this. Definitely look back over a number of prior posts. There is a few guys here that are really good! I guide predator hunting and do about 50% e/calls and hand calls. If your good with a duck call, not too hard to get the “feel” for hand calls. Probably the hardest thing to over come is to slow down and work the call. You’ll need to get away from that faster cadence, and think out a slower dieing rabbit wha.waaaa,wwwaaaaaaa,….wwwaaaaa, waa,waa,waa,wwwaaaaaa….whimper…

For calls, there is no one great call works perfect every time. Unlike a great mallard call that works everywhere, I have found different calls work better in different regions. Some ares work better with deeper calls, some higher pitch, and so on. Also, the difference in an abundance of juvenile cotton tails Vs snowshoe is a huge difference. I know calls are not cheap, but it does make a difference in trying different calls until you find the one for that area that works better. I’ve had good luck with the Primos CY-Yi?? A Randy Anderson model. It has an adjustable reed, so different sounds are easier. If i were to go out today and buy three calls that I never used or heard, I would buy 1. small plastic,2. much larger plastic, 3. a wood tube. You would have a huge variation in sound between all three calls to match the food base.

One more thing to get is the cheapest dog toy you can find. I do mean the absolute cheapest thing around. Those little squeekers can work wonders. I take one out of the toy and keep it in a pocket near my mouth. Easy to access and keep in my mouth while a gun is drawn. Keeps the hands free for those leery dogs that need that last little bit of convincing.

Location – If you think a whitetail is smart and has a good sniffer, I don’t think it even compares to a coyote. Almost all coyotes (yes, sometimes there are stupid ones) will come in from down wind. They can pin-point the sound origin from hundreds of yards away. They’ll sneak down wind, and come up with their nose into the wind. I like a location that gives me the best possible vantage point with the wind quartered across me. I study an area to know the most likely den areas, feeding areas,… This way I have a good sense of where they most likely will come from. If the wind is wrong – STAY AWAY and come back another time. I try to aviod the wind direction to be directly from my set to the spot I think they’ll come from. No sense in them smelling you before they ever make an appearance.

Don’t over call – a couple minutes at a soft to medium volume. Wait and then wait some more. Follow up a softer 30 seconds of calls, wait a few minutes. Then go a little louder and wait. I spend 30 to 50 minutes at a set.

Hope this helps a little

What Randy Said

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What Randy Said

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Yup!!!! True story I’m going to save that myself! Thanks Randy

Thanks for the great advice, Randy. That should be enough to get me started. I think I’m going to pick up that Primos call.

I also saw an instructional video with Randy Anderson . . . so he’s a pretty reputable guy?

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Thanks for the great advice, Randy. That should be enough to get me started. I think I’m going to pick up that Primos call.

I also saw an instructional video with Randy Anderson . . . so he’s a pretty reputable guy?

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Randy Anderson knows more than enough to get himself locked into some good contracts I’ve noticed in a lot of the instruction vids that there is an equal amount to learn from observation. Watch them 3 or 4 times. You’ll hear and see things you missed.

I was just thinking that my deer grunter has a distressed fawn call on it. Is that something that could be useful or should I just stick to the distressed rabbit?

Also, should I skin them before I take them to the trader provided that their pelts are decent or should I just bring them in whole?

I like to stay more seasonal to my calls. When the fawns start dropping in May/June, distressed fawn calls work great. I haven’t had good success with them in other months. But keep in mind, that is works for me. You may have better results.

Pelts – Put-up Vs. in the round. You will always get top dollar for a pelt that is clean, well scraped and dried, and small bullet holes that are sewn up. Each phase you do less, your docked or not paid for. My experience has been a buyer will under-pay for a coyote in the round. There are a lot of variables that he can not see. How intense is the bullet hole, was it filled with fine shot, is the pelt still prime, are the hair roots still solid, and so on. These are things you don’t know until its skinned. Also, skinning a cold or near frozen coyote is just down right a pain the in . The connecting tissue gets super tough, and it takes much longer. I like very much to skin them in the field when I can, while they are still warm. Skins easy, and I use 2 different knives. I use a 4″ thinner long blade for my general cuts, and a 3″ round tip blunt style blade for cleaning. I scrape and clean the pelt as I skin and seal it in a bag. At home, I finish the last of any scraping of cartilage and a little shampoo/wet rag to clean up the blood. From there, its slide it on the stretcher and reverse it( fur out)when the inner skin gets to the point of not being “sticky”. Like I said, a good buyer will pay accordingly for each phase you do, and how well you do it.

The coyotes we have shot in the last 2 weeks are in pretty sad shape here. Females had the neck and hind end bit up, and males were much worse from fighting. Hair was also showing signs of slipping, so value is very poor.

Breeding has been going on here for the last month, so a lot of distressed pup calls, lone female howls, and some aggressive challenge calls have produced activity.
Ice is coming off the rivers here, and I’m about booked up with walleye guiding. So chasing the song dogs for me is about done until after spring turkey seasons.

Good luck and remember to have fun. Frustrating when you make 5,6,8, 10 stands and nothing. It’s that one-in X that gives you the adrenalin rush. Take small steps and continue to learn as you go.

Ok, so they didn’t have the Primos call so I picked up a Buck Gardner and a Johnny Stewart distressed cottontail call. The Johnny Stewart came with a 3″ plastic rod that fits into the mouthpiece of the call. What is that thing and how am I supposed to use it? There’s nothing about it on the JS website.

PC-10??? Reed Plunger for replacing the reed. Hunters Specialty sells replacements for those

when i started hunting these amazing animals i had a lot of the same questions. i believe the best way to shorten your time learning how to call these animals is to, in the beginning, only call spots you know hold a good number of dogs, or only call spots after you have spotted a coyote. i learned a lot about them in a short period of time by spotting than stalking to withing 3 to 400 yards(when possible) than calling. the dogs i spot out moving in the morning are very responsine to a variety of calls if you can get out on them without being seen. our group had excellant success this year bringing animals into a call after being spotted. a lot of times just a lip squeak got them coming.save a lot of time and frustration by finding them first than hunting them. you are much more likely to get the critters attention when you have an idea where they are and where to focus the calling. the calls you bought will work great once you get out and work a few dogs and figure out what worked and didn’t. point he shotgun out front and the rifle down wind. hope this helps and good luck. as for the squeaker. i never leave home without 2.

Thanks for all the advice. Unfortunately, we didn’t see any coyotes. We made about a half dozen sets throughout the day, which is the most we could do on the limited amount of land we had permission for.

5 minutes into the first set, I had this visitor, though. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1knfJdP1UYQ

I saw him poke his head out the hill to check us out. I kept calling and he waddled his giant butt right across the open field in front of us. I’ve hunted coons some in the past and I’ve never seen one this big. He circled back around and that’s when I got this video.