Lonny--This is going to be a long explanation, to just tell you where I had the caller pointed. I wish I had taken a photo of the spot I set up in. (The camera was too heavy to carry along.)
It wasn't ideal, but I didn't want to take a chance and expose my presense to any possible coyotes to the NW, north or NE of me. Normally, I sneak in to where I have an unobstructed view of everything in front of me and to the sides for at least a 180 degree panorama.
In this spot I had a small rise to the NW of where I set up; a continuation of the ridge that I laid on to the east of that spot. The little ridge was about 200 yards away from me and not real high, but high enough so I couldn't see straight NW of that little rise. I could see all of the terrain to the west of that little rise and I could see at least 150 yards north to a little rise that came up off a huge slough. The area from about 150 yards north to approximately 300 yards north sloped down to the slough and I could not see that area. Then after that I could see all the way to the north horizon. My visibility to the NE and east was 300+ yards to a very low rise, about 75 yards of area behind the rise I couldn't see and then it opened up into a large flat area to the east.
I pointed the caller pretty much straight north. The wind was from the NW between 5 and 10 mph and the sky was overcast. I was really surprised the coyotes responded that quickly from so far away when I had the caller set at the medium low volume. I think we (at least I do) tend to underestimate the acuity of the coyote's hearing once in awhile.
The sound is NOT very loud from the side or behind the call. However, I don't think that will prevent coyotes, fox, or bobcats from responding from the sides though. The volume level was well below that which I can obtain using a Tally Ho, Circe, Critr Call, etc. I don't understand all the technical aspects of how sound is dispersed, but perhaps if you set the speaker horn pointed upwards, you would get a more even distribution of sound in all directions. This is NOT a scientific opinion, just a wild guess.
I haven't experimented with the remote as to distance. I did step off about 40 yards at one spot and the remote worked fine. I had the Foxpro about 25 to 30 yards from me where I called in those coyotes.
I think I will also try to find some type of motion attractant to attach to the Foxpro or set up near the caller. Something that will move in the wind. I think someone on another board used feathers to build a fan shaped attractant, attached the tube from a ballpoint pen to the back of it with a hot glue gun and then slipped that over the top of the Foxpro antennae. I had the Foxpro hanging off the side of my camera tripod with a small cord. I had the speaker cone sticking out of the face hole of one of my white ski masks, but I'm sure it didn't look like any rabbit these coyotes had ever come across. Maybe even one of those store-bought toy rabbits would have had the first coyote stumbling all over itself to get to the wascally wabbit instead of circling to get the wind.
[This message has been edited by Silverfox (edited 03-17-2001).]