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TRIPLE WHOOPS
New Year’s Day 2001 fell right about in the middle of my freshman year of college. After a fun party to ring in the new year I decided the next morning to go hunting. I’d shot quite a few coyotes to this point in my life but I hadn’t actually done it solo yet. I’d always hunted with my dad and he took care of the calling. So, morning rolled around and I decided to give it a try. I strapped on my snowshoes and started walking. I wasn’t sure how far I needed to go, or where exactly I needed to go so I picked a spot my dad and I had called before and decided to go there. It was an old stock pond. Large dirt mounds on either side of a man made water hole worked great to call from.
After a mile and half or so hike from the road I was creeping up on the bank on the north side of the pond. It’s pretty flat here so even a large pile of dirt Can elevate a guy enough to see for a mile or more. The biggest challenge is getting to the top of that pile without letting every coyote in a mile know that you’re there. So I walked up the bank until I could just see over the top and glass the area To see if there’s anything within shooting range before I start blowing the call. This particular day there was nothing so I crawled to the top of the mound in an effort to keep from silhouetting myself on the skyline and laid down prone behind my dad's Ruger 220 Swift.
This particular rifle is a M77 heavy barrel laid in a Brown Precision stock. At this point in time it was wearing its third barrel and had killed more things than many hunters' entire collections ever will. It shot very well and was (and still is) one of my dad's prized possessions when it comes to his guns.
I got out an old closed reed call made by Cerce. It was a jackrabbit in distress version and sounds pretty awful when you get on it hard. Awful sounding Varmint calls are most certainly a good thing. I blew my first series and after 3 minutes of calling stopped and waited. I had a large coulee to the north of me, a large coulee to the south west of me and an open pasture to the west and East. After looking over my shoulder for a minute or so I focused on the coulee to the north and there was a coyote. His head and chest just sticking up from over the bank. I was almost in shock. I had killed enough coyotes and fox at this point in my life that I wasn’t overly flustered or panicked but the simple fact that I had done the calling and was hunting solo for the first time had got me pretty excited.
I was a darn good shot for a young person and didn’t miss very often. But I was an awful judge of range. For some reason I always thought stuff was farther away than it was. Combine that with a very flat shooting varmint rifle and it's pretty easy to shoot over stuff. And I did. All I could see was his head sticking out, so thinking he was a ways off, I laid the crosshairs just over his head and fired. He took off like he had a rocket in you know what.
I was devastated. In fact I was so busy being devastated I hadn’t even noticed the other coyote to my left, standing there, wondering what the heck was going on. My emotional roller coaster was nearing a peak again as I fired at the second coyote. Nothing. He ran off never to be seen again. Now I was mad, I couldn’t understand what was going on with my shooting. As I was going into my third sentence of four letter words I realized there was yet a 3rd coyote that had come in late behind me. Apparently he knew I was having a bad day of shooting and wasn’t concerned. Emotional roller coaster was rocketing up and I fired again. However after the last 30 or so seconds of my life had been irritating to say the least, I wasn’t ready for the shot and once again missed.
My first solo attempt ended nowhere near the way I had pictured it. 3 coyotes called in, all from different directions. 3 seemingly easy shots. 3 misses.
It was a long walk back to the road.
The author with three of the five coyotes killed on this stand. The 50 grain Berger bullet performed flawlessly on all three dogs.
Fast forward 17 years and there I was again, hunting in roughly the same area. My equipment and experience had evolved quite a bit. I was carrying a 204 Ruger that I had purchased from a friend a couple years prior. The gun was built on a Remington 700 action fitted with an 8 twist Douglas barrel. Originally the barrel was finished at 24”. Prior to this coyote season I had the barrel cut down to 18” and threaded for a suppressor. I don’t care for guns with longer than a 20” barrel if I will be hunting with a suppressor. I had loaded up some 50 grain Berger bullets with H4895. Velocity was around 3300fps and it shot remarkably well. 3300fps is by no means blistering fast for the 204 but with heavy bullets it worked quite well out to 300 yards. The now discontinued 50 grain Berger was a great option in 20 caliber bullets for coyotes. Easy on fur and it seemed to anchor coyotes where they stood.
I had been glassing the area a few mornings prior to this particular day and witnessed a group of 5 coyotes bedding in the same draw on several of the morning scouting trips. I had the right wind and some time to make the mile and a half walk out so I took the opportunity. I made the decision right away I would only use a single lone female howl when I arrived at the spot I wanted to call from. It seems from my experience a female howl doesn’t create a lot of tension among coyotes. Males are usually interested and females respond equally as well, presumably trying to ward off another possible reproductive female. On my walk out I saw the group of coyotes but instead of 5 I only was certain I saw 2. They were a bit ahead of where they normally were at this point in the morning so I was worried I wouldn’t be able to get to the slight rise I needed to be on in order to have a good vantage point. . Thankfully there is just enough topography for me to get low enough they couldn’t see me. I moved quite fast with the hopes of trying to get a bit ahead of them if I could. I crawled the last 100 yards up to the top of the rise.
I couldn’t see any of the coyotes. A few things ran through my head. Did I spook the whole group out? Did they see me and change direction? I was worried I had screwed it up. Experience kicked in and I glassed the area. No coyotes anywhere that I could see. The only place they could be was roughly 400 yards in front of me in a small draw. The same small draw they had laid down in the days prior. After I glassed the area I laid there for about 10 minutes. Just to observe and let any coyotes that might have been on alert, relax and go about their business. Over the years I’ve found that to be a very good habit to maintain. Occasionally a coyote will end up in your lap without ever having to disturb the area with a call.
I grabbed my howler, a cheap readily available call that sells for $9.99, and let out one lone female invitation howl. It wasn’t quite breeding season yet but I was confident if the coyotes were there, it would create enough curiosity for at least one or two of them to come have a closer look. Roughly 5 minutes went by and a coyote appeared walking over the slight rise created by the draw the coyotes presumably were in. First one coyote, then a second. I was pumped. Then a third. Then a forth. Then a fifth. In my lifetime of calling coyotes I only ever called in 5 at the same time one other time and only managed to kill one of the group. My heart was pounding pretty hard and all I could think was…..don’t screw this up. The first coyote stopped and was passed by the second and third. This was most likely the dominant or
A great shot of the rifle used and another look at the three coyotes. Two females and one male. A wide open eastern North Dakota pasture lies in the background.
breeding female of this group or possibly the mother of a family unit that had not yet broken up. She was about 300 yards away. The two coyotes behind her had also stopped, out of sight. She immediately changed direction and rather than coming straight towards me, she started to circle to catch my wind. She was moving to my right and as she did this the two coyotes that had continued towards me had now stopped about 150 yards away. I was set up to shoot downwind so I couldn’t move but rather wait for the female to walk into my sight picture.
Ten or so seconds went by and she did exactly that. She stopped broadside right around 200 yards and I fired. DRT. (Dead Right There). Immediately I turned to shoot the other two that were close. I missed the first one. The second coyote stopped and I connected. I grabbed the howler and let one quick howl rip. One of the two coyotes still in the draw came out and I was able to make that shot count as well. Of the 5 that came in I was able to kill three all DRT. A bumbled second shot cost me number 4.
As morning hunts go this was a great one. My rifle, bullets and plan worked to near perfection and I had converted on my first triple. Some may scoff at that saying if a guy has hunted as long as I have you should have been able to achieve it by this stage in your life. I disagree. I had only ever been given the opportunity a handful of times prior to today. Calling in multiple coyotes and killing multiple coyotes takes a whole lot of luck and perfect timing. The norm seems to be killing one or two out of a group and walking away counting the experience as a victory. I’ve been at it long enough to know when success is worth celebrating. This was most certainly the case.
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