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Why, I was fighting with my snooze alarm I don’t know. This was Sunday and I wouldn’t be making my way to the shop to fight with peoples automotive problems. I was going out to call coyotes. Finally, after three times I managed to realize that the alarm wasn’t set to get me going for work, it was to get me out into the desert to hear the coyotes greet the sun. I jumped into my camo, gathered my rifle and shotgun, threw some shells in my pocket grabbed my calls and my keys then raced out the door. I was already 20 minutes behind schedule and the sun had started to lighten the eastern sky. A quick stop for supplies and I was cruising at 80 mph down the freeway. I reached my exit as the sun began to peak over the mountain chasing the last shadows from the valley. In my mind I could hear the coyotes welcoming the sun with their serenade, but I wasn’t there to actually hear it. On this day, the guy who invented the snooze alarm needed to be shot! I began to gear down; my gravel road was coming up. As I rounded the corner, I started to take time to notice my surroundings. The sprinklers that had run all night in the hay fields had a layer of ice under them. A Raven sat on a center pivot irrigation system. I smiled, “Hello Raven, where are the coyotes?” If he knew, he wasn’t going to give them up just yet, because he simply watched me drive on by. Three miles down the road, on my left stood the first coyote of the day at about 350 yards. “Hello, Coyote. It is going to be a great day!” I continued up the road public land was just ahead. I crossed the cattle guard and found low gear and idled down the dirt road that had been beaten to flour by the antelope hunters. I glanced in the rearview mirror and smiled, the dust gently drifted to the south, perfect. I turned on a two track road and made my way north, some fresh scat lay in the left track letting me know coyotes were still in the area. I rolled to a stop in a wide spot in the road. I wasn’t too concerned about hiding the truck the brush I was about to set up in would do that for me. I rolled down my window and lit my ceremonial cigarette, held it in my left hand and extended it out the window to double check the wind. The smoke curled and twisted off the end of the Marlboro and drifted south. I scanned the area and tried to imagine where the coyotes would be. I hoped the farmers had already started to move their sprinkler pipe and had pushed the coyotes into the 40 acre brush patch in front of me. I was getting anxious and the cigarette was not helping, it was another fix my body needed, and it wasn’t getting it sitting in that truck, sucking on that coffin nail. I took the keys out of the ignition and carefully opened the door. I took a moment to load my rifle, then my shotgun. I walked in one of the tracks of the road and made my way north. The brush was about waist high and fairly thick, it was going to be tough to see a coyote approaching from any distance. I came to a curve in the road. My delusional side could see the coyotes running up the road towards me in response to my distress cries. I made my way around the bend until the road straightened back out and I could see 300 yards or so. I sat down on the west edge of the road and looked around. I had a little opening to my left and the two-track was all I could see. My inside voice, or the voices of others that frequent the message boards around the internet, told me to keep an eye down wind. I slowly turned my head to insure that I could see in that direction. I could see a little but I knew the coyotes were going to be packing the mail straight up that two-track road. I set my Remington 700 in 22-250 aside and out of the way. My Remington 870 sat in my lap and ready. Over the summer I had purchased my first custom call from Lance Homman of PREDATR calls. I picked his latest style, a walnut barrel closed reed call with a 25-06 case for a mouth piece. I let out three violent raspy jackrabbit screams and waited a few seconds, then started pleading and mixing in a scream occasionally for 25 seconds or so. I sat listening and watching, I saw some sage grouse cross my two-track road with their necks stretched out as if sneaking away from something. I smiled, thinking I had some action. I squinted trying to make out the coyote that had spooked the grouse and couldn’t find him. I began another series of pleading screams slowly turning my head to the down wind side. As I turned my head a coyote landed in the east track of the road and three feet behind me, I yanked my shotgun out of my lap and struggled to get it pointed to my right, by this time the coyote was directly to my right and just on the other edge of the road. My shotgun roared sending 1 3/8 ounces of tungsten iron BB’s over the coyotes back. I pumped in another round and let it fly kicking dust out from under the coyote’s belly. I realized that I needed to calm down or this one was going to get away. I took a deep breath and swung the shotgun with the coyote as he ran through the clearing to my left. This time after the shotgun leapt in my hands I saw the coyote’s tail go into the air as it sailed over his head. I paused and watched to make sure the coyote was not going to get back up. I sat back down and continued calling after a couple of more series I caught movement out of the corner of my eye to my left this time. I yanked my shotgun into position, and yanked the trigger just like the first two shots on the first coyote. This coyote kept on running and got into the brush where a shot was impossible. Had I been able to take that coyote I would have called it a day, and gone home. But I needed one more coyote to stay even with my mentor on the year, whether we will admit it or not there is always a little friendly competition between us. I gathered up the coyote and made my way back to the truck. I fired up my truck and
drove a mile or so and came to a likely spot. A wild fire had burned all the
brush south of my current position and had penetrated the large brush patch
occasionally leaving alleys that a coyote would have to cross on its
approach. I sat down and called for 30 minutes, nothing showed. When I got
back to the truck I looked a little more closely at the area I had driven
through. The sun was getting high and it was starting to warm up, the
coyotes would soon be shading up until evening. I decided that my chances
were better to call that area than spend time searching for another place.
Besides, the truck had been parked there for 45 minutes or so, plenty of
time for a coyote to forget about the trespass. I walked about a
quarter-mile from the truck, and set up in some brush with June Grass
openings all around. I gave the birds some time to forget about me and
started with my regular violent screams. This time from my all wood PREDATR
made of maple, the cotton tail screams hadn’t finished echoing across the
brush before a coyote was bounding through the june-grass to my left. I
slowly raised my rifle into position and centered the cross-hairs on the
coyote’s chest. When the coyote filled the scope I barked with my voice,
this brought the coyote to an abrupt stop. I put pressure on the trigger
and the coyote tensed up and tipped over. I immediately got back on the
call screaming I sat there in the silence, and surveyed the little opening, one….two…three. That can’t be right so I counted them again, and again. Sure enough there were three dead coyotes in that little opening in the brush. The guy calling and shooting those coyotes on that last stand had to be an imposter, the first stand was typical and expected from me. Like a good friend said, a stand of all stands, that each stand from here on out will be measured against. I personally think they will probably fall short for quite some time. -B.J.W
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violently for a few seconds. Then I waited and watched keeping half an eye
on the coyote laying there. I reverted to my normal pleading with an
occasional scream for a few series when I saw a blur cross a distant
opening. I raised my rifle and waited and let out a few cries for insurance
sake. The coyote appeared at the edge of the opening that the first coyote
had just crossed. She seemed hesitant to cross it but a lip-squeak got her
right back on course. The coyote was centered in my scope and I caught
movement to my right and close, I rolled my eyes in that direction and there
stood a third coyote about 30 yards away looking at the first coyote. The
third coyote started acting a little nervous and began distancing himself
from the situation, he stopped about 40 yards away and looked back, he was
closer to cover so I took that shot. He tensed up and began to tip over so
I turned to the second coyote, she was on a run dead away, I barked and her
pace slowed, I barked again and she looked over her shoulder, a third bark
brought her to a stop and she turned broadside. I exhaled and began to put
pressure on the trigger, the Remington leapt in my hands and the third fell
the same way as the first two.
