NC Mountain Coyote Calling

squatch

New member
I am new to trying to call in coyotes and want to pick yalls brain.

The location that I am in is in the mountains on NC on a couple hundred acres of woods and cow pasture. I have seen plenty of coyotes on game cameras at night near the open areas, and the only time it was set in the edge of the woods it captured one in the morning. This is all private land and unless there are poachers, there should not be anyone else calling or hunting on it. I know that the dogs are there, and I want to find out how to get them, as they are interfering with the cattle. They can be heard at night howling and yipping up a storm. It is down right spooky sounding.

Equipment: I am using a primos ki-yi and have only tried the rabbit in distress calls. Tonight was my first trip out and like I figured I got nothing to come in/respond.

Question: In the east, should I hunt the open pastures or the woodlands? The only time that any are seen in the fields/pasture is at night. If I hunt the woods how deep in should I go? Should I hunt near creeks or some of the old logging roads? What time of day would be best?
 
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in the daytime, try to be set up inside the woods about 40-60 yards or so, overlooking a deer trail or any natural path coming from the thick stuff where they spend most of there time and have the wind in your face or at least have a crosswind blowing your scent out into the fields. at night you can hunt in the fields and other open places and see stuff but in the daytime you want have as good of luck calling them open places. and try not to over call. most of these in the mountains has heard all the tunes before and has swung in downwind undetected to discover humans making those noises at bonfires and campgrounds to scare people or try to impress there buddy's by howling to try to make real coyotes howl back at them. they say the average coyote has a coverage of 10 square miles but i believe here in the mountains that its an even bigger territory so using trail cameras is a good way to kind of tune in on there patterns and get a since of when they are in the area and target those times. i call in way more bobcats then i do coyotes here in the mountains and i believe that is because bobcats don't go out of there way to approach a call downwind like coyotes do and even if a bobcat is downwind, human smell don't seem to spook them at all in my experiance
 
Here in TN (close to you) I've found that we kill most of ours as they are running the edge of the woods. We usually put the call in the field (if there's a field we're using) and get into the woods a few yards. The coyotes are NOT very anxious to go into the field so they run the edge of the woods and stop and look. It's rare for us to see one in a field. They prefer to stay against the cover. Also, bobcats were mentioned above. We do have a lot of bobcats in this region. When you set up to call, don't break the stand for at least 30 minutes or so. Bobcats can be stubborn and come in slowly. I spooked 2 last year by breaking a stand too early.
 
The way that this land lies I can't put my back to an field and be able to overlook anything. The woods are uphill of all of the fields. Should I set up just below a ridge line in the woods, with the wind blowing my scent over my head/the ridge?
 
i guess you could try it. i have called a bobcat down hill to me and one time i called a coyote off a ridge across a creek from me. both of those times i was waiting about 5-8 min between sounds. maybe they just got real curious and exposed there self's while trying to sneak in cause they was not quite sure where the sound was and was looking for it. i don't know if that is the case but that is what i feel happened. the ones i have had run in on me, i was always up high and calling down the mountain. i really haven't had that much success to say for sure on anything though. GC hunts the Ozarks which i guess is about the same as these mountains. he has helped me a lot on here over the years. look through the "calling tactics and sounds" thread at the top of this "calling in the east" section of the forum. its long but its a great starting place.
 
Update:

I hadn't had much time to get out and try calling again, but I got out the other evening about 30 minutes before dusk. I was literally 30 yards from my back door leaned up against a locust tree and I successfully called in a coyote. Man was that exciting. I was able to get a shot off at it with a 20 gauge with buckshot, but it didn't anchor it and I couldn't track it down. So I unfortunately lost my first one. Anyway I am currently looking for a good optic for an AR, and plan on using that in the future with 55 grain vmax loads.

I think that I discovered one of my problems. I think that I was blowing a little too hard on the call at times and was producing a squeal that should not be heard in a rabbit in distress call. I eased up on the pressure this time and had success.
 
How long should I let a stand area rest? I do not want to overcall and have them get smart too quickly. That is one reason I am trying hand calls. Also when I was calling I heard some crows start making noise, is that a good sound?
 
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yes. listen for the crows, blue jays, squirrels, songbirds. they are all good signs. as far as waiting to go back i cant pinpoint an exact period to tell you. some people has had success waiting a couple days. most people wait a couple weeks to a month. some people wait until next year. the other night i was getting settled in and was just about to let out a howl when a pack started howling about 300-400 yards up the ridge above me. they got done and i waited a minute then howled back with no response then set into my best creation of coyote fight. a doe was out in front of me watching real alert like and in a panic and about that time mother nature had her way with me and sent some 30 mph wind gusts right towards where they howled. the doe between us started blowing and shot out of there. i just set there for about 20 min without making a sound and left. i am guessing that whole pack is educated now and i will probably go back in a month with some different sounds and a different setup but my chances of calling a coyote in that area has now went down to 10% i believe.
 
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