Tell me about the decoy dogs

podunkcowboy

New member
Ive read about you guys using "Decoy Dogs" alot now. Would a few of you explain how it all works and what your sets are like, terrain, calls etc. Thanks ahead of time.
 
Originally Posted By: podunkcowboy Ive read about you guys using "Decoy Dogs" alot now. Would a few of you explain how it all works and what your sets are like, terrain, calls etc. Thanks ahead of time.

check out the website

www.xbandits.com click on predator video and watch the dogging for coyotes.
 
Thanks guys, Mr Tebbe that really cleared it up for me. Im wanting to raise one of my pups to hunt varmints and I think yotes would be fun.
 
Thanks Prkgrp, I just watched doggin coyotes 1 & 2. Very cool videos. Someone from here needs to make a newer version of a decoying coyotes video. Hint, Hint!!!
 
Originally Posted By: yfzduner450Thanks Prkgrp, I just watched doggin coyotes 1 & 2. Very cool videos. Someone from here needs to make a newer version of a decoying coyotes video. Hint, Hint!!!

duane and i will be making new video 5 days in june,
 
Podunk, there are is lots of info if ya look back thru old post.I wrote an article awhile back, I'll find it and post it again so you can see it. Duane
 
Podunk, he is an article I wrote for an outfit a few months ago, Hope it sheds some light on the subject for ya.

Decoy Dogs, “One Mans Perspective”

2pm, and dirty hot, have a chance to call a yote, so I decide to take “Bert”, and see if he is up to the task. Bert is one year old, and this will be his first “real” calling stand. I set up on a fence line, and get the sun to my back the best I can. Wind is crossing, and I feel fairly confident that things are going to go my way.
I start out will a “pup distress” on my old mouth call, 30 seconds of blowing my lungs out, and I quit. Now I wait for 3 minutes before I call again. I never did make the second series of calls. A yote came up the fence out of site, and at 15 yards Bert saw the yote.
Now we have a race, the yote running for his life, and Bert trying his heart out to catch it. I spent the next 3 hours trying to find my dog, and never did kill the yote.
That was July of 1998, I was just out of college, and I had a “bright idea of taking my yote calling to the “next level”. I had no shock collars, and no tracking collars, just a fair knowledge of yotes, and of dogs.
Fast forward to today, I have a pen of 10 dogs, I breed and train coyote decoy dogs, and consistently kill 125 to 150 yotes a year.
One of the most common questions I get is “ how did you get from one dog that was marginal, to a pen full that are great” Simple answer, stubbornness, and hard work.
There are two basic types of decoy dogs, passive, and aggressive.
A passive decoy dog will sit with you when calling, and his job is to be a “visual decoy”, the yote sees the dog, and keys in on it, the dog should sit behind you, and not engage a yote.
Aggressive decoy dogs, will engage a yote that is “hung up”. The dog will go to the yote, and pick a fight, as soon as the fight starts , the dog quits, and returns to the handler. I insist, and train my dogs to “go behind”. I don’t want a dog blocking my shot at a yote, or multiple yotes.
Why do decoy dogs work?
Decoy dogs work because the nature of a yote is to protect their territory, and fight to the death for it. There is an innate hatred between domestic dogs and coyotes. When a coyote sees a dog, they want to kill him, or at the least run him off. This does not mean that all yotes will “work the dogs”. Young yotes many times are scared of a dog, and they will leave the country. Mature yotes will “most times” ( I use that term loosely), engage a dog, or pair of dogs.
In my pack I have sight chasers, passive decoy dogs, and aggressive decoy dogs. This leads to the next question, and answer.
How do you train a “Decoy Dog”?
This is a loaded? What type of dog fits your style? Most guys cannot do what I do, and have a few of each. The first thing any person new to decoy dogs needs to decide is “what type of dog do I want? Then train accordingly.
The very first thing is “control” I learned this lesson the hard way in the early days.
I start all my dogs on fresh yote hides at ten weeks, but I will not hunt them until they are solid on a “ sic’em, and also a “come back”. Those two commands are not debatable, they must respond instantly. I use the very best “e collars”, when training, and also when hunting any of my dogs, even my finished dogs.
I could write a book on the details of training diff styles of decoy dogs, but for the purpose of this article, I will hit a few highlights.
First of all “Common Sense Wins”
If you want an aggressive long range dog, you need to be dragging yote hides, and encouraging your dog to bite. If you are calling and the dog comes to you, he needs scolded, he needs to learn what you expect.
The flip side is if you want a close range dog, you need to nick him with an “e collar” when he gets out to far. The same principle applies; teach the dog what you expect.
“Decoy dog” means diff things to different people, to me it’s a dog that helps me harvest more yotes, and I expect, them to engage, come back, and run any blood trail I set them on.
In my opinion a large part of what decoy dogs do, is hold cripples. Let’s just be honest, guys make bad shots once in awhile, I would rather have dogs that can find those cripples and hold them, than have any wounded game get away.
7 AM, I’m hunting a contest, I have crawled into a spot in the rocks, over looking huge sagebrush flat. My hunting partner is 50 yards down wind of me. “Ole Bert” is loose, and moving around about 200 yards below us. John “lip squeaks” yote spotted, I give him the “thumbs up”, shot fired, yote dead, Bert goes to the dead yote, and yote # two arrives, Bert picks the fight, and runs to me, I kill that yote at 10 yards. I send Bert back into the brush. Yotes 3,4, and 5 arrive on the seen. They are building into Bert, and he is fighting his way loose and comes behind me. Yote # 3 killed by John at 15 yards. The other yotes pull the pin, and leave. The next day we went back to the same spot with Bert, and killed 2 yotes, are they the same two that got away? Who knows?
The date was Jan 16 2008.
Bert is still alive; he is “retired”, and will live out his life being my “Buddy”.
I make no promise that a “Decoy Dog” will increase your yote harvest, but I will promise if you do your part, calling coyotes with a dog, can be the most fun you can have.
For more info about me or my dogs, www.shooterservicesunlimited.com. Duane Freilino.
 
If you don't mind sharing Duanne, how did you or how do you train them to come in behind you like that with a coyote trailing them?
 
Truthfully?, put lots of yotes in front of them, and if they come up in front of me, I grab them by an ear, and drag them up my right side, when they are "behind", I pet them.
It cost me some yotes when my dogs are young, but they learn pretty fast.
 
Originally Posted By: Duane@ssuHow did I get dragged into this? I'm just a cowboy with a few dogs, and a camera.


you'll be famous one day lol
 
Originally Posted By: Duane@ssuFamous heck, I just wanna have a good dog one day!

to bad the dogs can't drive a tractor
 
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