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Finally, Kirby and I were on our way to do some hunting down in Arizona. We were excited. The year before we had a great hunt, we called and killed more coyotes in a day than we ever had before. Our expectations were high and we were going to do even better this year because we were going to take some time to do some scouting. We decided to start around Kingman and work our way south. The first night we found the plan for sleeping in the truck was not going to work. I froze my butt off because I didn’t want to unpack my sleeping bag. Morning came soon and the sun revealed some prime habitat that was sure to hold coyotes. We did some driving, walking, and howling. We saw some quail, wild burrows, more quail, and a few road runners. We did see some tracks and scat but they didn’t seem to appear quite often enough to tempt us to hunt there. We made our way down to Lake Havasu and explored some of the public land around there. There, we found some sign, but noticed a lot of evidence that ATV’s were likely to be a problem. It would have been good for a few stands but not what we had in mind. We were now two days into our trip and discouragement had started to set in. The coyotes were not answering our howls, and we hadn’t even seen a single coyote yet. We were in prime habitat and were seeing a few tracks and scat but we were looking for a magical place. The search continued. We decided to go to South-East Arizona where we had hunted the year before. We found more sign than we had seen so far on our trip. We got two coyotes to answer our howls just after the sun had come up. We explored the area a little further and found more sign and spotted a few coyotes from the truck. Finally, we found a place that was likely to be productive. We could relax a little now but we wondered if a more productive place might exist. We went back to Central Arizona and did some exploring. We spent the night howling and saw several grey fox. I was amazed at how easily those little guys could be manipulated. One fox ran across the road in the headlights. I came to a stop near his last known position. We fanned a light out into the brush there was no sign of him. I decided to do a few lip-squeaks and here he came on a string. He finally stopped just a few yards from my truck that was idling on the road. We laughed at him and continued to mess with him for about 15 or 20 minutes then continued on. We ended up in the tall timber near Flagstaff before the sun came up. By this time Kirby and I were both tired and irritable, and a little discouraged to say the least. We did a little driving around in the daylight and found some likely places in the area. We saw elk rubs everywhere and some sign of coyotes here and there. So far the best place we had come across was way down south and east so we got a hotel room and slept, well at least I did, Kirby got his sleep while I was driving. We were burned out and took a day off and visited a couple of local attractions and bought our hunting licenses. We camped a few miles from where we planned to make our first stand. Morning came and we were off, we called hard and often, we made 21 stands 10-15 minutes in length. We managed to call up two coyotes, the first Kirby spotted on its way out of the area and we managed to shoot him. The second came in and winded us and escaped unscathed. Darkness fell and we needed to get on the road so we could get back to our second best spot and get an early start. We rolled into our camping spot at 2 am. We quickly got situated and sleep caught up to us rapidly. We awoke as the eastern sky began to get light. Kirby opened the door and could hear a coyote chastising us from down wind. We gave it our best effort to coax him in for a shot but it was pointless. The wind picked up and we made a couple more stands, on the way back from our third stand, I started muttering under my breath, “Hash browns, eggs, bacon, pancakes….” Kirby was quick to pick up on it and said if you want to that would be fine. So we made our way to town for breakfast. We were lower than a snake in a wagon track. This hunt didn’t come close to meeting our expectations, but now I’m disappointed in myself for quitting early. I learned a lot about myself on that hunt. I learned that if I’m out in coyote country, I need to be calling, whether there are a bunch of coyotes in the area or just one or two. I learned that I enjoy calling coyotes but to spend the time scouting them out for big numbers doesn’t appeal to me. I guess I will always be a lazy recreationalist, who would rather be lucky than good. In retrospect, Kirby and I limited ourselves in many ways. We were looking for habitat that fit our style of calling. We didn’t bother to give a second look at areas that may have held many coyotes because it didn’t fit our definition of a good calling area. I now feel that to be successful and gain consistency in this sport one must adapt his calling so he can call where the coyotes are if it is open country, close quarters or somewhere in-between. -B.J.W
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