Most years, when there is a good prey base, you can get the coyotes in around the livestock cleaned out during breeding and denning season and then kind of relax a little, but you still don't let your guard down, you keep your snares set and keep checking for tracks. Sometimes there will be lone coyotes or coyotes that have paired and are running together without pups that really didn't set up a home range that will move into the vacant areas. I was out in early July and had a big male coyote in a snare he was dead but still in good condition, he hadn't been in the snare more than a few hours, his coat was shed off and he was slicked off nicely except his tail was almost bare, it didn't look like mange just the hair was gone. I had seen this a time or two before where the old dog would baby set and the younger pups would play with his tail biting and pulling it till the fur was gone. He was in the southern fence between two pastures and the next pasture was notorious for having coyotes' den in it's rough, rocky draws and pine ridges. Suspecting there may be some pups in there I got ready and started to check it out. I was about a half mile into it running a ridge road when down in a draw I jumped four half-grown pups. I stopped the truck and headed down into the draw the pups ran into a hole, I put my long-sleeved outer shirt over the hole and went back to get my truck with the things to get the pups taken care of. My sweaty shirt did what I wanted it to, and the pups were all still in the hole, I wired them out of the hole and cracked them on the head with my piece of oak that I kept in my truck just for that purpose. I loaded the pups in my truck and headed out of the pasture with them. I had them and the old dog in the bed of the truck and dropped them off by a gate a couple of miles away as it was late in the day by then. Early the next morning I came into the pasture from the back side hid my truck in a draw and walked to a large rock pile one draw over to the south of the one I had taken the pups from. I took my rifle and howler with me and just sat up in the rocks to listen and watch the sun rise. As the sun was coming up and it was nearly light enough to shoot a high-pitched coyote started to talk, she was looking for her missing pups. She let out two high pitched sharp barks then two high pitched short howls waited a few seconds and did it again. I let her talk for a minute or two and then answered her with high pitched like puppy talk the same as she was saying. Two sharp barks and two short sharp howls she stopped talking then gave a few kiyi's and got quiet. I just sat and waited, she came toward me and stopped out a couple hundred yards from me and gave a long lone howl, I replied to her with my own high pitched long lone howl. She moved in to a hundred yards did a shorter lone howl I answered her with the same shorter howl, she turned a few circles and laid down in her nest of grass comfortable in thinking she had found her pups and they were safe in the rock pile. She never woke up from her nap, but she did join her pups and mate at the gate.
Ramblings and Such From Hunting Coyote
- Thread starter DSheetz
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HRM Johnny
Well-Known Member
Great story!
WYO300RUM, hang in there. The first 3 days are worst, then you get incremental improvement. Just keep at the PT and you will be ready for hunting season when it gets here. I can tell you it sure is nice to have a working knee again for elk hunting once you get through rehab. Take enough time on rehab, and work steadily. Don't get over ambitious so you don't set yourself back, it is pretty discouraging to have to stop, heal again, and regain ground you already covered. Have seen several people do that.I'm going to be in a few minutes the just informed me. Rehab already! The drugs are working now. Two doses of morphine in recovery didn't do anything. Was hurting some. The pills they gave me about an hour ago helped a lot
I don't know if they told you, but it is a lot like healing from a broken bone, since that is kind of what they just did in cutting to put the parts in. So look at it as needing to have 6 weeks to heal a break. The incision heals a lot faster and might fool you into thinking you are good.
Meanwhile, DSheetz does have great stories to keep you entertained.
DSheetz, have you ever had a coyote running away from you, but looking back at you, trip and do a somersault? Pretty funny.
M77Fan: no, I haven't had that happen. I jumped one up once that ran down a trail, I had a snare set in and watched him hit the snare. When he got to the end of the 8 feet of cable, he did a back flip. that was pretty amazing to watch. By the time I got to him he had used up all of the cable and was wrapped up pretty tight. I too am a fan of the M77, my older model 70 Winchester is nearly the same action as them, with the three-position safety. They can be made pretty accurate.
WYO300RUM
Well-Known Member
Thank you M77Fan !
It's still pretty sore. I have my first therapy this morning 10:30am. Thank you for the kind words and info
swelling insane . I posted pics but removed. Not proper for this thread
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Once again, a lot of the country is facing a winter storm with high winds, heavy snow falls and subzero temperatures. Most of Wyoming's highways are closed due to winter conditions I hear a lot of people complaining about the road closures they are closed for people's safety. It's not so much that if you want to go and put your life on the line as it is that when you make bad decisions and travel on closed, slick roads with bad visibility as it is that you are then putting other people's live on the line to come and save your sorry butt. Yes, I have been caught out in below zero high winds with zero visibility stuck in a snow drift that you couldn't dig out as fast as it blew in. There are times when you are traveling, and the weather isn't bad but as you travel the sun is shining, there isn't hardly any breeze then you get out between towns and the wind starts to blow a once dry road now has snow blowing across it that melts then freezes turning the road surface to an ice skating rink, the winds continue to increase in speed till now you have snow blowing up to 6 feet above the ground and zero visibility you can't even see the edge of the road let alone from one decliner post to the next do you stop or do you continue to try and drive? I knew a guy that chose to continue to drive till he hit a simi that had stopped in the road. I once worked for a company that told the workers they had to follow a D-9 cat into the job site and back out again after the work shift was done or find a new job, I found a new job after a few trips in and out. I saw cars pushed into the piles of snow that had gotten stuck trying to get to work. The job site was 62 miles out of town this was in 1978 I have learned a little since then please stay home if you can be warm dry and safe someone else cares for you and wants you to be around for them in the spring.
windypants
Well-Known Member
I've been reading through this whole thread and saw your coyote/badger story. I watched a different type of encounter years ago. I was watching a badger hunting ground squirrels when a coyote came along. The coyote charged it as soon as it saw it. The badger headed for a nearby hole it had dug, but the coyote grabbed it by the butt and jerked it out as it was going in. Of course, the yote let go and dodged away when badger turned on it. Again badger tried to get down the hole and coyote grabbed it. This happened three times before badger got away. He must have been plenty mad at that point, because once he got turned around in the hole he tried to goad the coyote into trying again so he could return the favor. After a bit badger disappeared down his hole and coyote went on his way.
This must have been a young coyote that hadn't yet learned that a badger could provide food without actually being the meal. I captured this whole encounter on video back in the pre-digital era, but have no way of playing it now, even if I could find it. I was once an aspiring wildlife videographer, but was never able to make it pay. I loved the field work, but not the marketing.
This must have been a young coyote that hadn't yet learned that a badger could provide food without actually being the meal. I captured this whole encounter on video back in the pre-digital era, but have no way of playing it now, even if I could find it. I was once an aspiring wildlife videographer, but was never able to make it pay. I loved the field work, but not the marketing.
WYO300RUM
Well-Known Member
We got more snow and wind today.
Supposed to get down to -17 tonight. -11 wind-chill -33 right now . Tomorrow and Fri. cold but no snow then starts warming up again. I bet you have more wind, snow and colder there 
stay warm and safe everybody. Goodnight. 
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Here we got around 8 inches of snow. The wind slowed down some from gusts of 60 and 70 mph to around 15 mph steady breezes. It was 24 below this morning I didn't notice any wind knock on a couple of trees it will stay calm. I am supposed to go to Casper today but might wait till Friday or Saturday as the roads are still closed and they say they won't be open till after noon. Any appointments can be canceled and rescheduled for a later date but then you won't need to do that if you're in the hospital or worse. I feel it's better to be safe than sorry. My wife was telling me about a woman that was saying she would pay someone to take her to Casper, people told her the road was closed so she said well I expected them to know that and use the back roads. Foolish is as foolish does they are closed as well, and you still put yourself and others lives at risk doing that kind of stuff. Even LifeFlight was grounded for safety.
-24 in North Cheyenne this am. That's true temp. Don't know the wind chill. House is cold and all I hear is my propane rank hissing under demand.We got more snow and wind today.
I hope that you had it filled instead of waiting as some people do. I don't do the Facebook thing, but some people do, the last storm we had here a woman was posting on it that they sure wished that the county would get out and open their road because they lived off the grid and their propane tank was getting low as well as them needing groceries. What the 22334 were they thinking it had been predicted for a couple of weeks in advance and they still weren't prepared for it. When I was a kid, we lived in Midwest, and we kept at least a couple of months of food on hand and the propane tanks filled. My Grandparent's lived at Orin, and they might not go to town all winter long. The propane tank was checked often and filled long before it needed to be. Yup I'm going off the grid but relying on someone else to take care of me instead of planning ahead, knowing what needs to be done before hand, and thinking it's someone else's responsibility to make sure I survive while I home school and say I live off the grid. Darwin would be pointing, laughing and saying something about natural selection probably. I was lucky that I had older people, that had needed to actually live off of the grid as is said now, to teach me how it should be done or not done!! Be safe, be warm, and dry the best you can. We do have a wind chill warning in effect this morning but at this time the wind is only 3mph with an actual temp of -18.
I now have a great propane vendor. They were at my - and all my neighbors places - to make sure no one ran out. Didn't give much - about 300 gallons each - but at least enough for a couple of weeks if the shtf. Great service.
4 years ago wifey and I were so drifted in we couldn't walk or drive - or dig out for - 3 1/2 weeks. I was terrified about the propane situation. Power was out for 4 days with the whole-house genset gobbling fuel. No way could/would the old vendor deliver due to the 20'+ drifts that covered access to the tank. When they could finally get to us we had 50 gallons left! (In a 1,000 gallon tank. 4 weeks later I bought and installed another 1,000 gallon tank and siamized them together on a manifold. I sleep a lot easier now. That one had me shook up!
WYO300RUM
Well-Known Member
That is foolish
back roads would be worse because of no maintenance. Went to bed last night was -11 wind chill -33 blowing snow. No wind today. Sunny. -15 right now. Stay safe and warm Dave. Waiting patiently for more stories. My rehab
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