Spring Coyote

Last Spring, I was fortunate enough to take a good friend out in the blind after spring turkey.  It was her first year hunting, so under the mentoring program, it was required so go with someone her first year.  Her boyfriend had to work, so I jumped at the chance to go out and call for her.  We went out on a cool spring morning in the 5^th week of the Wisconsin season.  The birds had been active all week, but an early May blizzard through the activity off.  We sat out in the blind that was on a cut cornfield edge, and had the decoys at a comfortable shooting range, as my friend was trying to get her first turkey with a bow.  We had unfortunately high winds that morning, topping 20+ mph, and the birds were presumed upwind from us, so it was safe to say the calls were not heard.  After a few hours of calling and no responses, it was decided that we’d try out another spot across the property.  On the walk out, I heard a Jake by himself not too far away.  My friend and I set up on the edge of the wood line and threw a decoy on the trail.  After a few yelp sequences, the jake had not yet responded, so I decided to leave my friend by the decoy and climb up the ridgeline to look down on the adjacent field that I thought the jake had traveled to.  I caught a glimpse of his head bobbing over the ridge, so I quickly retreated back down to the spot and tried calling again.  Nothing.

Picture taken during the calling
sequence that brought in the coyote.

After being frustrated with the high winds and inability to even call in an ignorant jake, we decided to call her quits.  As we were walking out along the edge of the cornfield, our faces into the wind, we noticed movement 60 yards in front of us in the field.  It was a pretty yellow coyote that seemed to be trotting right along the path the jake would have taken, coming towards our calls.  We stopped in our tracks and I told my friend to drop to the ground.  Suddenly, the coyote took a hard right and was practically running right towards us, still upwind so it had no idea we were there, and we were perfectly still.  I pumped two turkey loads into the coyote and it let out one long howl before dying. 

Upon inspection, it was a milking female that only had 3 legs.  Its milk was near dried up and the leg wound looked to be a gunshot wound or car hit from when the yote was a pup.  Being that it was May, and that I peppered the coyote with 2 turkey loads at 15 yards, the pelt was of no use, but the landowner was very happy to know that some fawns and turkeys were spared as a result of our quick thinking!  In Wisconsin, it is legal to shoot coyote year round, and often times spring turkey hunters encounter coyotes coming into their calls or decoys.  If a hunter is concerned about predator control in their area, it’s a good idea to learn to do prey or pup distress on your turkey mouth diaphragm, or simply carry a separate call when you hunt in the spring.