Coyote shakes off kill shot

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SupressYourself

Active member
What do you guys make of this?



I've hit several a bit high this year with my thermal rig, so I know what it looks like in the thermal, but this is the first one that's taken a single step afterwards.
Sadly, we'll never know for sure because he was not recovered. We tracked a pretty good blood trail a few hundred yards down through a draw before it died out and we decided we'd be better off making more stands.

Note: 22 Creedmoor shooting 75 ELDMs.
 
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Without seeing a clearer look at the shot my initial thoughts are gut shot. It seems In my experience a guy shot coyote will sometimes go down try to chew at the wound then lie there gathering a second wind before getting up to wobble off
 
You hit, but not lethal apparently. You possibly shocked the spine enough to temporarily paralyze him.

I was deer hunting and had a buck come out we wanted gone. I decided where I was that a neck shot would save me a possible tracking job and a serious uphill pull.
I shot he dropped! Climbed down in my climber, went to the deer and even took a pic to send to my son. Went back to the truck and took off safety harness and excess clothing and drove down as close as I could. As I topped the hill, that buck got up, shook his head a couple of times and took off when he saw me.
In my case I never found blood, but did get that deer on camera 3 weeks later. He was nocturnal after that, lol. Another hunter ended up killing him the following season about 400yds from where I “killed” him.
 
timn said:
So we’re you out of ammo?
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Actually, I almost was. Had two rounds left after shooting 9 coyotes on that set. But the real reason I didn't shoot more was I didn't actually see him get up. I was on my scanner looking around for more. My rifle just happened to be pointed at him the whole time. When I looked back with my scanner, just saw a coyote running off. I didn't know it was the same one until I reviewed the footage.
 
spotstalkshoot said:
Bullet impact very close or just touched the spinous process, causing minor tissue/skin/hair damage and a temporary nerve disruption? So you have hair and blood at the site plus blood trail. Very difficult to catch up to a coyote with 4 legs in use(or even 3) and no lung damage.
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That's what I was thinking too. Low enough to send a shock to the spine, but too high to sever it.
 
I was out in New Mexico a couple years ago hunting with a buddy. We were on a huge tract of public, walking out a 2 track and smacking coyotes the whole way. We had a stand where we sat kinda perpendicular to each other about 100y apart, sort of a x-fire scenario. I walked out, set the call, walked back, with the wind directly in my face, maybe 5-10mph. I hit a rabbit, and within 10 seconds it sounded like a buffalo was about to run me over from behind. I froze. This coyote ran right next to me, within 18", and then ran straight down the trail I walked twice, all the way to the call. Somehow his nose never helped him. I gave him the old Texas heart shot, and he folded. I kept calling for probably 20 minutes. We finished, and i walked over to my partner, we had a laugh, planned our next stand, and then I went to get the call and drag the coyote into the bushes. When I got to it, it picked its head up and looked at me like I had just woken it up. It jumped up like it was fine and took off. I was able to hit it again before it made it 20y. The first bullet had entered at the butthole, traveled end to end, and blown through one shoulder, blown a big hole in its neck, and blown most of it's lower jaw off. You could put your fist in the hole in its chest. It laid there stone still for at least 20 minutes before it jumped up and ran. They are so damn tough..
 
SupressYourself said:
Sadly, we'll never know for sure because he was not recovered. We tracked a pretty good blood trail a few hundred yards down through a draw before we decided we'd be better off making more stands.

Note: 22 Creedmoor shooting 75 ELDMs.
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Sorry, don’t agree with this at all. If you have a good blood trail I don’t understand why you’d decide to let it suffer because you lost interest. We’ve all had a few get away, it happens, but leaving a good blood trail because you’re tired of looking isn’t cool.
 
I would expect you hit the same spot as the other guy in the Relaoding and Ammo section here, the splash damage thread.

I think you hit the shoulder high. SGK or TSX type of bullet would punch through that area, even a bad high hit will go through the spine stopping the dog and most likely severing the arteries in the area leading to a quick kill.
 
I would say you hit that coyote pretty good. Because of the numerous stops/pauses it made after it was hit. Then it loped off. A few coyotes I hit pretty good, did the same. Two of which I recovered the following day. As I seen them laying dead around 1/2 mile away from where I shot them. Sometimes a coyote doesn't know it's dead. Tough critters ;)
 
I wouldn't want to guess how many wounded coyote I have tracked for hunters I know, including me. Some were 4+ days after the shot. One was a week. A guy told me he shot one at night(full moon traditional scope) a week earlier, said there was a good blood trail for a couple hundred yards. I went out with him to look. Snow was crusted hard and wind polished some dirt in the worked bean field. But some blood was still visible, weathered to very dark. I followed it up over a hill to where he said he lost blood. Found a shallow melt, where the coyote cleaned himself up and moved on. Tracking was very slow. A bit of blood, occasionally a partial track the right age(there was other coyote tracks). About a 1/4 mile to a fence line, just some old t posts/strand or two of wire and grass. At the fence line more snow which was bad, tracks and blood covered by drifting. I ended up walking circles trying to get back on the track. After a 1/2 hr we went back to the last blood. Standing there looking/talking I told him I didn't think the coyote went much further than where we were at the fence line. I noticed an odd bump in the snow on the east side of a post and clump of grass. I went over and used my boot to move the snow, the coyote jump up and ran out into the field. I had my .22 pistol in my hand when I kicked off the snow. Shot the coyote when it stopped quartering away at about 25 yards. It ran a few steps stopped again and I put another in the ribs. It went down and I ran up and put one in the head. Decent fur so we skinned it. His shot was right in front of the back hips,left side thru out the right side. 22-250 50 gr Federal varmint ammo(50 rd box from Wal-Mart) 185 yards. Big common factor wounded coyote will get under, in something and hide. And don't mind snow covering them wounded or not.
 
tawnoper said:
Sorry, don’t agree with this at all. If you have a good blood trail I don’t understand why you’d decide to let it suffer because you lost interest. We’ve all had a few get away, it happens, but leaving a good blood trail because you’re tired of looking isn’t cool.
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I agree that my initial description of the tracking job was limited and not that cool. I'll clarify that the blood trail was good at first. Then it started to peter out to the point where it was a drop here and there and even with good snow, you had to do a few circles to get back on it. There were a lot of coyote tracks through that draw, so staying on it without blood was near impossible. I've tracked a few hit coyotes like that before. They can go for miles. In the daylight you might be able to catch another glimpse on a far hill and get another shot. In the dark you're not likely to accomplish much.
 
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Rock Knocker said:
I would expect you hit the same spot as the other guy in the Relaoding and Ammo section here, the splash damage thread.

I think you hit the shoulder high. SGK or TSX type of bullet would punch through that area, even a bad high hit will go through the spine stopping the dog and most likely severing the arteries in the area leading to a quick kill.
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Nope. This was no "splash". I've killed enough coyotes with this combo now to know it's going to make a big exit on a broadside shot and stay in the body on a head-on shot. Like I said, I've hit a few high this season, and it blows fur and tissue many feet in the air. If I hit the spine or just under, the top half of the coyote is missing. I believe in this case it was just a hair too high to destroy the spine.
 
Coyotes I shoot more than a few and trap even more when I shoot or trap a Coyote i kill it, I can't remember the last one that got away wounded if one leaves wounded to go off and die good, I was going to kill it anyway i'm not saving pelts nor am i saving Coyotes lives , that's the difference between Sport hunting and Predator control, they are not pets. Murl B.
 
In my opinion, what it looks like to me is it got hit near the last section of its ribcage and a tad bit high. Just missing its lungs. That's one bad thing about thermals is you don't quite get the details of a lot of that type of stuff. But pausing the video at the shot it almost looked like you pulled it to the right ever so slightly and missed the lungs. About the only thing you can do is if you see them flopping at all or if they have their head up is shoot them one more time. They may not always need it but I've seen miraculous recoveries myself so I've shot more than a few again that didn't need to be shot again. But they might have too. They're tough animals so if there's any sign of life I'm just gonna shoot them again. I've had to track too many that I thought were dyin.

Heck I shot one twice with my .450 Bushmaster back in November. Her legs and tail were still going after she fell over. It looked like it was snowing when that fur blew up off the ground. It was stuck in the trees and bushes all around that coyote. But I'll tell you this much, all movement on her part stopped in a hurry. And it sure did look pretty. That fur floating down in the sunlight like that.
 
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