First time out coyote hunting.

Swampfox710

Swampfox710

New member
Do apologize for the long post but would appreciate feedback from more experienced Coyote hunters.

Received a Fox pro patriot for my birthday Christmas Eve. Went out to public national forest in the upstate of South Carolina. Even though it’s still deer season. Tried my hand at locating coyotes before dawn. Found one group a long way off from the road. Deer hunters started rolling in so I decided to drive a few miles to get closer to the group. Called and got no reply. Ended up traveling to a different large parcel to find no coyotes answering the social howls. Drove back to the area that I got responses from. Came in from a different access road with no hunters. Slowly stalked my way in to the general area I believed the coyotes was in earlier. Found fresh scat along old logging road. Examined and it was full of hair. Set up with call about 30 yds up wind of me with my back tucked into a cedar tree. Did a 20 min calling sequence nothing but hawks and crows came to investigate. Moved about a quarter mile further down the road. Set up the same and ran another 20 min calling sequence using different calls. Nothing but a owl and hawk came to investigate. Stalked further towards the river and spotted a deer hunter. So I backed out to not interfere with his morning.


Drove to another area howled a few times every mile or so. No response. Decided to do a blind set in a pine/hardwood bottom. Ended up calling in my first coyote to my surprise a blond color phase. Appeared out of nowhere in a drainage coming in hard. I thought it spotted me and I shot as it was coming directly towards my caller. Cross hairs was at its throat when I squeezed the trigger. I was about 20 yds above it on the hill with an elevation difference of 20ft I would estimate. Saw it crumble and roll to its right out of my line of sight. I hit the pup in distress just in case it had a friend. 3 minutes passed and I got up to retrieve my prize. Coyote was shot at 10:40 am. To my disbelief I found no coyote. Only thing at shot location was blond fur and 3 tiny 1/4” stringy pieces of meat with no blood. Did semi circles looking for blood or a dead coyote for 1.5 hours and found none. Bullet was a 62 grain barns tsx .223. Would a different bullet like a vmax have better performance? I will have to use a shotgun after Jan 1st due to our regulations for public land. I was thinking about trying the tss #4’s.


Did a grand total of 6 set ups and had only one coyote sighting and no other predators. Is the lack of other predators and sporadic population on these large tracts of land normal?
 
I don't know nothing about South Carolina, but between deer hunters and other callers, public land can be tough.

I doubt the bullet was the problem. There's not much to shoot at on a head-on coyote. If you hit dead-center, any bullet will drop them, but if you're a little off, you blow off a shoulder and they roll, but then run off on 3 legs.

Put a diaphragm caller in your mouth when you call. Use short barks to stop them. It doesn't matter how close they are, it's hard to hit a moving coyote perfectly.
 
Down here I don’t hear much during the day down here. Heck, this year I haven’t heard much of anything at dawn, dusk, or in the middle of the night, lol.
 
Things went quiet around me after deer season started. There's a lot of human scent in the woods and gut piles they can feed on. I'm visiting family down South for the holidays but I hope to be get after them in the new year. There will be a lot less hunters after and hopefully they will be hungry. Mating season starts as well and I hope the males will be territorial and come to investigate coyote vocals.

Edit: I noticed you asked about V-max bullets. I shot a coyote earlier this year, in the chest, with a 55 grain V-max and it dropped right where it stood. It fragmented pretty good and left several small exit holes near the shoulder.
 
Last edited:
Sounds like a good outing for first time try, I myself run a shotgun in woods, the fact you had one show up at all with all the sent and disturbance of deer hunters you are doing something right, keep after them.
 
I would guess that on 90% of the calling stands that we hear coyotes we don't kill any coyotes. Very seldom do we kill coyotes after we have heard them.

Most of the coyotes that we do call in and kill, we never hear them before they show up. In the open country that we call in we normally go at least 1 mile between calling stands.

Even in thick cover or thick woods I think I would move at least 1/2 mile between calling stands.
 
Back
Top