# Fur is starting to get bad.



## alleyyooper (Mar 31, 2017)

Eric stops by to pick me up about 1:30 PM fresh from a home showing. Sun was really trying to break thru the clouds but still temps were only in the high 40F range and the north wind had a bite to it. Eric drives us to a sheep farm about 20 minutes from my place. Said he had called them Monday evening and they had reported hearing coyotes in the evening for a couple of weeks now. 


We get there and grab our gear start walking back to their little wood lot that is connected to a larger wood lot across the line fence. We find where we want to make our set on a knoll that provides a good view of the area and will work good with the north wind. We set out both weasel balls fairly close together and clip a couple turkey feathers on to make them look larger. Once again we start out with the horney female sound, not sure how much longer that sound is going to work soon I expect. We had almost decided we were not going to see anything when Eric sees a pair ghosting thru the trees about 80 yards down the knoll, looks like they are trying to circle us. When they get to a fairly open area where Eric has his cross sticks set he fires once and the second time nearly on top of the first. Both are down within feet of where they stood, I am always in awe of how well that rifle is working for Eric with no muzzle jump and him being able to get a second shot off so quick. He is always telling me it is learning to shoot with both eyes open so you acquire the second target quickly. I have never been able to master that.

We get to the coyotes and only one is a male the other is a female and her fur is patchy. Drag her to a brush pile so she will be out of the way and go back to the other one the male his fur isn’t bad yet. I had sort of figured the fur was going to be spotty now as the deer around the house are shedding like crazy. I’ve picked up plenty in a couple days to make deer hair fly’s for this summer. We had got a inch of rain over the week end mostly Saturday so we are not going to chance driving closer to pick up the coyote. We all have made a pulling harness with old back pack straps so once wrapped in the plastic they do slide fairly easy, we take turns never the less.


We drive to another place close by not more than 8 miles, Drive in and park, farmer is hauling manure from the loafing yard to spread in nearby corn stubble but stops to talk. Tells us they saw a pair of coyotes after the rain had quit Sunday working a bit of land they have left grass to grow in which was something they had been doing since the CRP days as it seemed to help the soil some. We walk back to a fence line where the north wind will yet be in our favor as the sun pops out. Glad I am wearing my light camo rather than the heavy stuff but I knew the walk in would warm me as would the walk out. Again we used two decoys with the feathers clipped on and went with the Piglet in distress sound.  Waited 15 Minutes without seeing a thing not even a bird it seemed so we up the volume a bit and added in the second caller with a happy group of coyotes. At 30 minutes we just stopped and sat, nothing showed at the 45 minute mark so we started packing the callers and decoys. Walked out and got back to the parking lot as the farmer came out with another load. Saw we were empty handed and asked if we had gotten one and the fur was bad. Told him had seen nothing would maybe try again later in the week.


As we are loading I hear Eric tummy grumbling and I asked if he had skipped lunch. He said no but thought was time for an afternoon hold me up. We drive to a little village once a busy place but has fell on times when the busy world fly’s down the express way 2 miles south. Even the rail road is gone now a hiking biking trail. It had once been a busy farming town with feed stores and a grain elevator. All gone today only the little restaurant that seems to still draw in a crowd, an insurance office (not Deans) a 4 pump gas station, post office and a village museum full of hay day pictures. So we put away our pie and coffee then make our way to another crop farm place.

This place is near a lot of flat low areas so there are a lot of places that just don’t get farmed today with the big heavy tractors like it did in the past with horses and small farm tractors. Farmers had once started to drain it with big ditches but the wet land act stopped that and they had to kick in a large chunk of money to buy another low lands to make up for what they had done. Makes great deer & coyote habitat which is slowly being over grown with autumn olive and trees of all kinds normally seen in this area. Once in a while during a dry year a farmer here and there will go in an brush hog it all down.


We get set up and do a pair of piglet in distress sounds with a pair of decoys set out. At 5 minutes three coyotes come charging across an open field into one of those grassy areas near us where we lost sight of them from our dirt pile along a ditch. We waited knowing they would probably try to circle us and they may have done just that as we never saw them again. We waited a good 50 minutes for them to show again but didn’t so we packed up and left. We did 4 more sets at 4 more farms and never saw another coyote. Wonder if the sun had warmed it up so the coyotes were not going to move till after dark.


 Al


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