At sunset, I ran out to make a couple quick sets for coyotes. Spent about 45 minutes at a spot that I was sure would produce. I saw something moving along a fence row, but never was able to ID it. On my way back to the truck, I decided to hit a spot along a creek where I suspected a coon den was dug into the bank. So a quick run to the truck and swapped out the 22-250 for my .22 Under the moonlight, and a little bit of patchy snow, I had about 10 minutes of chaos.
I pulled my foxpro out of my fanny pack and set it in a log jam across the creek from the den hole. I sat up high on the bank where I had a well lit view of the creek bottom. I turned it at about 3/4 volume level with a coon fight. It was only on for about a minute when the first coon stuck its head out of the hole. I thought for sure he was coming out to fight, but quickly took off running down the bank. About 10 seconds later, a second coon came out. Not taking any chances, I had the cross-hairs on him, and shot soon as he popped all the way out.
I let the call run for another minute or so. I could hear the water splashing then the brush moving. 3rd coon came flying from up stream and crawled right up on the log I had the foxpro on. Finally gave me a clear shot and dropped him. I let the caller go again for about a minute and half to two minutes then shut off. I was about to get up when I heard scratching on bark. After looking at all the trees around me, I finally spotted one crawling out on a limb. After trying to get my light situated and the cross-hairs on him, was finally able to drop my third one.
This was almost like having way too much fun. After hauling them back to my truck, I hurried down to another little lot of woods that I know has a few den trees. I set up in a similar way trying to get the best view point with the moonlight at my back. I did about 15 minutes worth of calling with no response. Decided to scrap the idea on the second spot to call coyotes and headed home. The largest coon that I took out of the tree was pretty clean, so I skinned him out right a way. The other two were muddy from being in the creek bottom, so I gave them a bath.
As I was cleaning the blood off of one, I went to grab it by its front leg to shake the water off and realized half the front leg was gone. I’ve trapped a few coon over the years that was missing a paw, but never half its leg 
January 9, 2012 at 2:25 am
#208916
wish they weren’t so resiliant as a population. 
