New to the board with a question!

[east coast hunter]

I am very interested in learning how to call in some yotes. I am from North Carolina and we are getting over run with them critters. I know out west where a lot of you guys are from yall have wide open land to set up on and glass over. Here its a little different. Mostly all we have is THICK THICK woods due to hurricanes and trees that have been blown over. With the exception of farm land, truck paths through the woods is about our only openings. Do any of you guys hunt places like this and how would you go about getting them dogs out in the paths or small fields???? Thanks in advance.

[LeviM]

I have no real experience in calling in thick wooded areas, but I would try to call them into any openings you have. Either shotgun, or rifle.

Have you thought about trapping?

[barebackjack]

I HATE calling continuous big woods areas. Tough to get a coyote out of it (at least before he winds ya). An electronic call with a remote, or calling partner comes in VERY handy. One guy (or the remote caller) makes noise upwind, the shooter sits downwind.

The shotgun is your friend in the big woods.

[lyonch]

You are going to read in most forums that people sit 15 to 20 minutes on stand for calling coyotes, but where you are located i would sit much longer. I would sit up to and hour on stand, because the coyote has a lot of cover to get through to get to you, and yes the shotgun will be your friend. As levi mentioned, have you though about trapping them? I think some snares (if legal) and a bait station could really put a hurt on them there.

[east coast hunter]

Well I have thought about trapping. We have a short trapping season here for coyotes (Dec. 1-Feb 28) but we have NO CLOSED SEASON on shooting them. The problem with trapping here though is we hunt deer with dogs and I dont want someones dog caught in my trap. Shooting the coyotes is the best method here I think. I may be wrong. But back to the topic, what kind of calls do you guys use to locate them and once you have located them what do you use to bring them in?

[DustyC]

I.m no pro by a long shot but. I use a howler and siren to locate. I wonder if some form of decoy might help to at least draw the coyote in a little better direction for you to get a shot? ie coyote, fox, rabbit, or fawn.

[barebackjack]

I did quite a bit of calling in MO when I was stationed at lostinthewoods. We were right on the north edge of the Ozarks, big woods, lots of big topography.

I tried using the same tactics I use here in ND, it didn't take long to learn it was a whole different ball game down there.

One thing I noticed about the big woods coyotes (at least where I was hunting), is that they are surprisingly quiet. Using a locater was useless, you'd never get a response.

Likewise, the times when you normally hear coyotes communicating was void of coyote noise. I never heard a howl, and only once had one barking. That area wasnt what id call over run with coyotes, (or 'yotes as the pro's call em ), but there were definitely enough around where a guy would have thought he'd have heard some vocalization.

It kind of reminded me of calling down on the TX/Mexico border down in the scrub (except their coyotes seem to howl all damn day). At least in TX they had mesquite trails all over so a guy could at least get em out of the cover for a second or two.

Couple things I learned calling big cover....

1. High pitched (high frequency) "bird" sounds and the like penetrate the cover better than low frequency sounds.
2. Id always start with a low volume call (ill even do this in open country if im close to cover). Ive seen coyotes very close to the call get spooked by high decibel sounds real close to them. It doesn't hurt anything, and you can always crank it up to reach out longer later in the set.
3. Like lyonch said, sit long, sit as long as you think is long enough, plus five minutes.
4. KEEP YOUR HEAD ON A SWIVEL. You really got to be on the ball in the heavy cover. A coyote can be on top of you, in your wind, and gone in the blink of an eye in the big woods/cover.

A good partner is good no matter what kind of ground your calling, but they're even more valuable when dealing with big, tight cover.

[Dcoy]

Consider a tree stand if you can sit still and have background cover-especially if you have a remote.Sit high,crosswind to the call with open shooting,as best possible,downwind of the call.

[east coast hunter]

Thanks for the help guys. I went deer hunting Saturday which was our opening day for muzzle loader season. I was sitting in about a 30 acre soy bean field when I saw a small buck slipping through the beans like a submarine. He would pick his head up and then disappear for a minute and then pop back up. He made his way by my stand and eventually went into the thicket behind me. About 5 minutes later I hear something coming through the beans right where the buck had just come from. I finally catch a glimpse of a large coyote. I drew a bead on him and let the smoke pole rip. He ran about 10 yards and crashed. I noticed the beans moving in a different location and luckily I grab a hand full of calls before I left the house. I got my muzzle loader reloaded and made a couple of rabbit distress calls and here comes another one. BOOM. Two coyotes with a muzzle loader in less than 5 minutes. That was fun.

[lyonch]

Sounds like a couple bonus dogs while deer hunting Good job!!

[LeviM]

good to hear, good pic!!!

[1Shooter]

Way to go! Sounds like you need to go "deer" hunting more often!

[MCSO961B]

also make sure you hunt pinch point also. They love to follow revines and low spots to sneak in on you. If you hunt openings in fence rows and places you know they cross it will improve your success rate a good deal.

show em no mercy!