Time on stand?

O

OKRattler

Well-known member
This will be a two part question. The first part is for your average caller whether it's for recreation or profit.

How long do you normally stay on stand and on average if you get a coyote to respond how long does it take?

I stay on stand 25 minutes. The average time coyotes show up is anywhere from 21 to 23 minutes.

The second part of this question is for people who hunt contest. Do you stay on stand the same amount of time or do you cut your time on stand in order to make more stands? I have a hard time cutting time during a contest because I know for a fact I'm combing over coyotes. In your opinion is a quality stand during a contest better than the quantity of stands you make?

To me it's a double edged sword. If you stand up at the 15 minute mark you may have just left before a coyote showed up. If you don't and a coyote doesn't show up you just burned 25 minutes.

One would probably think in Oklahoma the coyote population is high enough you can get by with 15 minute stands. I've killed way more past that 20 minute mark than under.
 
Last edited:
I guess I should mention if I'm after a bobcat that I know is in the area I'll stay on stand for 1 hour. I've called several up 45 minutes or more into the stand. I wouldn't call for a cat for any less than 30 minutes whether during a contest or otherwise. They can take forever to come in.
 
Recreation.
I stay on stand 15-20 minutes on day calls, on night calls 30-60 minutes.
Don’t know the average time coyotes show, sometimes one minute, other times 50 minutes, it’s quite variable.
 
I’m a 15 minute hunter. No matter if it’s just me or tournament hunting. The times I’ve sat past 15 minutes I’ve only ever killed 1 coyote. Maybe I’ve missed seeing some as I’m walking out but my successful stands have the rifle going off somewhere between the 3-10 minute mark. I’ll take number of stands every time.
 
dale06 said:
Recreation.
I stay on stand 15-20 minutes on day calls, on night calls 30-60 minutes.
Don’t know the average time coyotes show, sometimes one minute, other times 50 minutes, it’s quite variable.
Click to expand...
Just out of curiosity, why longer at night? I've never really given much thought into changing time based off of day or night stands so I'm just interested to know.
 
ruger300 said:
I’m a 15 minute hunter. No matter if it’s just me or tournament hunting. The times I’ve sat past 15 minutes I’ve only ever killed 1 coyote. Maybe I’ve missed seeing some as I’m walking out but my successful stands have the rifle going off somewhere between the 3-10 minute mark. I’ll take number of stands every time.
Click to expand...
If you've only killed one past that time I'd say stopping at 15 minutes is a good idea. I'd do the same.

I try not to sit on a stand and get stuck on something a coyote did on that stand at a time prior to that. They're very unpredictable animals at times and nothing is a guarantee but I do go by averages a lot and base my stand around that.
 
When I know a coyote can hear me, I’ll sit for an hour, especially at the first stand of the day. It used to surprise me what would show up at 30-40 minutes after just a few howls, but not anymore.
 
Fifteen minutes. Often more like twelve minutes. I'll stay an extra minute for every coyote that comes in though. About 50% show up in the first four minutes. About 80% within seven minutes. Not too many after seven minutes, but enough do show up between ten and fifteen that I usually stay that long. Generally, I'm really losing interest after seven minutes though, the percentages say chances are rapidly diminishing if a coyote hasn't showed by then.

Never did a contest. The guys I know that used to be really heavy into contests, were running and gunning like mad men. Fifteen minutes would have been a long stand for them. And they would literally run to and from stands. And drive like maniacs in between stands to get in as many as possible. Those guys did good, won some nationals and some worlds, back in the day.

- DAA
 
Predominantly night hunt for recreation and no contests from SW PA.
Minimum of 40-45min. most show up after 27-28 min and most are SILENT. If I get a response, it is not uncommon to stay in set for over an hour with much more silence than noise. A high percentage show up in the 15 min of silence that I end every set with whether I had a response or not.
 
Most of the coyotes we call in show up in less than 10 minutes, but we do have coyotes show up between 10 minutes to 20 minutes. I am to old to make 20 stands a day so my stands are 5 to 10 minutes longer than they use to be.

I am pretty sure the hard charging coyotes we do see between 10 and 20 minutes are coyotes that just changed locations to where they could now hear the e-caller. After about 7 or 8 minutes of calling I like to go to full blast volume for a minute or two so the coyotes 1 to 2 miles away have a better chance of hearing my sounds.
 
If I could have had a preview of how yesterday was going to go, I would answer this with zero minutes. I went 0-10 yesterday on stands.

Typically I spend 20 minutes. Most of the ground I hunt you can’t see for 1000 yards+. If they are coming you will know.
 
If I were to just up and go on a hunt where guys are having to stay nearly an hour, call very little and wait I believe I'd walk away empty handed. I wouldn't have a clue how to hunt there. It's interesting to see the vast opinions and tactics of people who are in different parts of the country and huntin the exact same animal I am. To me 25 minutes is a long time. To y'all that are waiting nearly an hour a hunt here would be a cake walk.

I gotta give credit where it's do. Y'all don't give up easy. The learning curve has to be extremely hard to get through in those States. The only way to get experience is having a lot of target opportunities and failing. It'd take forever to get those opportunities and after that hard work you'd hope there wouldn't be any missed opportunities. That would make missing or getting winded that much more frustrating. So I commend you guys for sticking with it.
 
Last edited:
I don't keep very good track of time. It's just a feeling, based on what I've seen or heard, or past experience on that stand, or if I'm too cold lol, or have to pee. I guess I'm not very scientific about my hunting and not data driven. I don't hunt contests as I don't want to turn my fun into a job and there's no way to compete with the guys that have access to massive un-hunted tracts like Turner's buffalo ranches.

That said, I listened to Nemnich and Pallet on a podcast a while back and they kind of agreed that most of the damage is done with 10 minutes of calling. He made the case that 3 to 4 minutes of each sound should trigger a response and have one within sight distance, if not he switches to a different type of sound and does that a couple times, if nothing shows it's time to move on. You can't argue with the numbers they put up, but he also mentioned there will be coyotes who come in slow, smart and wise, on some percentage of stands but he doesn't bank on those. Said something to the effect of "those aren't the coyotes I'm targeting".

I say, if you have a lot of promising spots to get to that day/night, the stands might be fairly short. If you've got 3 or 4 spots and your done, why not stay a bit longer.
 
derbyacresbob said:
I am to old to make 20 stands a day so my stands are 5 to 10 minutes longer than they use to be.
Click to expand...
Funny how that works, isn't it, Bob.

Seeing a pattern here; looks like those hunting where they can see into the next zip code opt for shorter stands and those of us who hunt heavier cover stay longer. Makes sense now that you think about it. In open country, by the 15 minute mark, if you can't see something coming, it's out of hearing range or definitely not interested. Those of us hunting cover never know what's coming until it steps out.
 
204 AR said:
I don't keep very good track of time. It's just a feeling, based on what I've seen or heard, or past experience on that stand, or if I'm too cold lol, or have to pee.
Click to expand...
+1
204 AR said:
That said, I listened to Nemnich and Pallet on a podcast a while back and they kind of agreed that most of the damage is done with 10 minutes of calling. He made the case that 3 to 4 minutes of each sound should trigger a response and have one within sight distance,
Click to expand...
Open ground hunters?
 
OKRattler said:
If I were to just up and go on a hunt where guys are having to stay nearly an hour, call very little and wait I believe I'd walk away empty handed. I wouldn't have a clue how to hunt there. It's interesting to see the vast opinions and tactics of people who are in different parts of the country and huntin the exact same animal I am. To me 25 minutes is a long time. To y'all that are waiting nearly an hour a hunt here would be a cake walk.

I gotta give credit where it's do. Y'all don't give up easy. The learning curve has to be extremely hard to get through in those States. The only way to get experience is having a lot of target opportunities and failing. It'd take forever to get those opportunities and after that hard work you'd hope there wouldn't be any missed opportunities. That would make missing or getting winded that much more frustrating. So I commend you guys for sticking with it.
Click to expand...
204 AR said:
I don't keep very good track of time. It's just a feeling, based on what I've seen or heard, or past experience on that stand, or if I'm too cold lol, or have to pee. I guess I'm not very scientific about my hunting and not data driven. I don't hunt contests as I don't want to turn my fun into a job and there's no way to compete with the guys that have access to massive un-hunted tracts like Turner's buffalo ranches.

That said, I listened to Nemnich and Pallet on a podcast a while back and they kind of agreed that most of the damage is done with 10 minutes of calling. He made the case that 3 to 4 minutes of each sound should trigger a response and have one within sight distance, if not he switches to a different type of sound and does that a couple times, if nothing shows it's time to move on. You can't argue with the numbers they put up, but he also mentioned there will be coyotes who come in slow, smart and wise, on some percentage of stands but he doesn't bank on those. Said something to the effect of "those aren't the coyotes I'm targeting".

I say, if you have a lot of promising spots to get to that day/night, the stands might be fairly short. If you've got 3 or 4 spots and your done, why not stay a bit longer.
Click to expand...
Russ, first off, in the winter when it is fairly cold, there is NEVER a set that I don't stand up and pee during it :( at least once and not uncommon to 'go' more than once-tehee.

Rattler, When I first started this craziness, we could only use lights if night hunting. I started keeping track of sets and in one stretch I had made 184 sets without seeing "eyes". Told myself that night to quit counting!!! And I did until thermals became legal here in PA. Still, I can go many sets and several nights w/o seeing-hearing any predators.
As for the learning curve, the fellas on here sure helped that along after I found out about this site and is the reason I became more than a 'lurker' the last few years. Watching videos on here in just a few months of seeing coyotes coming to the call taught me more than I could learn in a decade of my own experiences. I am not into social media as my take on most of what I have seen on it is "pat myself on the back " stuff and kill shots only.
 
Back
Top