How far to lead on a loping coyote?

You can practice by making running shots on Jackrabbits. It really helps me and gives you a good feel for how far to lead and just practice for overall shooting. Been doing it since I was a kid, but used a 22 with open sights in those days. Running shots still seem easier with open sights to me even now.
 
After hunting and missing quite a number of ducks, geese, rabbits, a couple deer and a couple coyotes you can usually watch the animal you are shooting at to tell. Ducks and geese will pull their head back if the shot goes in front of them and not do that is the shot is behind. Mammals on the other hand have a tendency to change direction if bullet hits or goes in front of them or just keep running in the same direction if shot behind them. Their ears I believe are sensitive to bullet or shot flight. Just my two cents.
 
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Loping coyote at 100 yards. Aim, one foot in front of his nose and be sure to hold your point of aim at the bottom 1/3 of his body. We push small woodlots and overgrown creek beds and have nothing but running shots. Over the years, everyone has switched over to semi-automatics. After each shot, remain calm and whatch for where your bullets hit before making the next shot. You will find that coyotes have three speeds, fast , faster and really fast. After each missed shot, the coyote picks it up a notch so you have to know how much more to lead him. Not many coyotes that pop up within 200 yards make it away from the members of our group for we all have shot many rounds out of our 243'S and know the speed and trajectory of the remington pointed soft point core-loct bullets pretty well. Here are a few we managed to kick up while we got the poor accumulation of snow that we briefly had !
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I just had to take a close up picture of the male we got with the big set of canines ! I have not seen a bigger set than these !

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Originally Posted By: singlecoilYou can practice by making running shots on Jackrabbits. It really helps me and gives you a good feel for how far to lead and just practice for overall shooting. Been doing it since I was a kid, but used a 22 with open sights in those days. Running shots still seem easier with open sights to me even now.

Me too. With open sights I can make running shots, with a scope I find it a lot harder. I wish we had jackrabbits to practice on.

BTW, those teeth are huge.
 
I can tell you how far to hold on them when they're flat out at 250 yards. I was shooting a 243 with the 55 grain nosler ballistic tip winchester supremes about 5 years ago. It took 2 shots. First shot I held what I believe was a foot infront of him, and snow flew behind him. 2nd shot I held 4 feet infront of him, and blew his rear hips out. There was no wind that day.
So, leading them between 5-7 feet on a dead run broadside should get them if your shooting a hot round between 2-3 hundred yards.
I've pulled off a couple similar shots since then, but it's truly amazing how they can seemingly outrun a bullet. They're friggin quick.
OTF
 
125yrds and under on a moving deer.I know that the 3 Bs work everytime. Butt,Brisket and boom. That bullet is there and is going to connect with it. Will it work for yotes? I don't see why not.
 
30 mph is 44 feet per second at a right angle. At 200 yds a coyote may move 8 to 10 feet before the bullet arrives.If he is running away a t a 45 degree angle it is more like 4 to 5 feet.. Hitting running coyotes at long distances is a lot of skill ,luck or lots of both.I used to shoot a duplex reticle and lead them the distance to the thicker part of the reticle and that seemed to work pretty well.I have shot many running coyotes because in a non calling situation that is often all you get, but still don't consider myself that good at it.
 
How fast can a coyote run?

I always thought a "lope" was just a little faster than them walking. Kind of that little bouncy thing they do. I would guess that 35-40 MPH was there all out speed, with afterburners and all. So, I would think a Lope was around 15-20 MPH.

However, I really don't know.
 
Originally Posted By: TA17remKeep leading them till you hit..LOL


time to get a gas gun haha, well maybe not, then you'd be slingin WAY more lead.

lol that was great. i can relate though, i have a REALLY old crappy video of a member here that will go unmentioned and a friend from high school dumping a 40 and 30rd mag at a yote going full speed right to left. its like the old war videos of dust flying up all over the place.
 
I didn't read this entire thing. I can say that you don't have to lead a whole lot with a rifle. The bullet travels way too fast to worry about that. Now with a shotgun the shot is only going about 1100 fps and that is slowing down real fast after it exits the muzzle.

Lead can be more then you think with a shotgun. you could get all technical but i'm not into math. I can tell you a 35 mph target at 40 yards crossing perfectly left to right will require about 9 feet of lead with a shotgun. YEAH THATS RIGHT 9 FEET!
 
I made a lucky shot on a coyote once, he was running full speed broadside at about 250 yards as he ran along a fence line. I aimed 3 fence posts in front of him and hit him in the head...lucky shot of my life so far!

Even if they are at a slow trot at 100 yds, I put the cross hair on the leading edge of their chest.

If you stop your swing as they are moving, you will shoot behind them everytime.

When you connect on a a running coyote, that's when your bullet construstion comes into play. Very often it is a quartering shot from the rear or quartering shot from the front as they run into you. In a 22 caliber, the Sierra 55g Spt and 55g BTHP(tougher yet) really do a great job.

Bullet speed can play a critical part in connecting on running yotes, especially when the distance is 100 yds or more. Slow bullets (2650-2800) dramatically increase the leade required.

When we were hunting Mexico, I went to a 6 Remington shooting the 60g Sierra's at 4000 fps to cut down on leade issues. Even a coyote walking at 150 yards requires a little leade and follow through with your swing. With the 60's at 4000, a hit dead center of the stomach or a little to the rear of the stomach, and the yote was laying right were he fell. In most 22 centerfires, if you don't break the diaphram, they will flip, flop, figure out they are not dead and are gone. 220 Swift and the 22/250 AI are great killers on non perfet hits behind the diaphram. 17 Rem and 17 M4 were not forgiving of hits behind the diaphram at all, most of the time.
 
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From years of shooting at running coyotes I think my shooting is more instinctive. I am never holding on the front of the chest. I am usually way out in front. I can never remember shooting in front of a coyote. I think I do the "track and pull". I lead them what I thinks is enough. I don't think I do a very good job of follow through with my swing. Most misses are over the back and that is because I lead in front of the nose which is natural. However, as someone else said you need to bring your crosshairs down to the bottom half or third of the body. I seem to never shoot in front or under a running animal whether it be a deer, antelope, or coyote.
 
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