Predator Hunting

It was just starting to get light and knowing daybreak is the best time to do a stand I told Travis, “Lets go ahead and do a stand here”. I explained to him, “We will go over to the hill, climb up the hill and try to get situated half way up on the downwind side”. On our way up the hill we heard coyotes barking so we tried to remain quiet while walking up the hill, but that was difficult because of the briars growing all over the hill. We finally made our way to the top of the hill, it was almost impossible to set-up halfway up the hill on the other side for two reasons. One: The briars were thick and made a lot of noise. Two: The coyotes were still going crazy barking and I was afraid they would hear us trying to descend half way down the hill with the rocks and briars. Travis decided to bring a 12Ga shotgun on this stand so I situated him near the caller, that way if the coyote came straight to the caller he would have a shot. I set up about 20 yards to his left, both of us on top of the hill with bush at our back to break up our outline. Climbing up the hill must of made us breathe a little harder then we would normally and the cool morning was evident with every breathe we took. We were both blowing smoke like a chimney. I couldn’t wait any longer, the coyotes were still going nuts, barking and howling. I have to get the caller going and see what happens.

I started the caller on low, the view we had of the area was unbelievable because we had the high ground. If it wasn’t for that we would have never been able to see more then 10 yards in front of us. The caller played for about 15 seconds and here they came. Three coyotes came running to the call out of the thick trees by the wash. I spotted them and put my scope on the first one, I didn’t want to shoot because I wanted them to come in to Travis were he would have a shot with his shotgun. The coyotes hit a clearing about 30 yards from us and started to peel off to the right like they saw us. I went ahead and shot the second coyote and quickly hit the Ki-Yi (wounded coyote) sound and the other two high tailed it out of there. We never got another look at them.

I couldn’t figure out what made them turn and run as soon as they hit the clearing. As I sat back and thought about it, I looked at Travis and could see the smoke coming from his mouth as he breathed and then it all came to me. They must have seen us breathing. I am sure climbing up the hill, having the coyotes close barking and howling – the adrenalin was high and the idea of controlling your breathing was impossible. In a perfect world, if we would have had two rifles on this stand we would have had a great chance of getting two dogs but with the cover as thick as it was a shotgun sounded like a good idea. The biggest problem on this stand was the fact that we were set up on the top of the hill and not halfway down the side which was my fault because I didn’t want to scare away the coyotes. If I had not heard them before we started the stand I would have set up halfway up the hill and we would have been able to camouflage ourselves better.

       I have been predator hunting for many years now and continually learn as I hunt. This is another lesson I will keep in mind. It is something I knew but the circumstances led me to make that decision against my better judgment. I will not make this mistake again and hopefully now you won’t either.

      We called in 3 on this stand and took 1. Score is one for the hunter, two for the coyote.

More on this hunt later.