How to reduce the coyote population

It is time for us to do something about our coyote problems. What do you suggest that we do at the state level?

At the State level?
You mean Govt Assistance??

I think that we are at a point that acknowledging their is a problem and compensating with reduced antlerless harvests in areas is a good start. Couple that with an Education and Awareness Program to inform the Public of their effect on the Wildlife and we will be off to a good start.

Start trapping ,I started last year it is very exciting!Clubs try to do the latest and greatest thing to help the deer,but none include predator management,and the coyotes love it!!!

At the state level!!! Not meaning by assistance but meaning a state wide effort. Like the bollweevil program. Everyone doing it.

It's a very good idea. I would like to see how much trapping coyotes affects the population in general. This would be more elusive than a deer population number, though.

You are correct. But comparing deer and coyotes NUMBERS ONLY would have to be in percentages because of the different population. And more importantly, a starting point number for both. So just kill them all and nothing else matters.

LOL. If you figure out how to kill them all, you will be a very rich man.

Based on my rookie observations, coyotes are incredibly smart and cautious. And they make hardly any noise walking. They are low to the ground, making them hard to spot. With as much nasty, pine plantation areas that we have in this state it will be a miracle to even put a dent in their population.

I see almost as much coyote sign at my place as I do deer sign, yet I never see coyotes. Way too big of a range and way too smart.

I don't know a lot about coyotes, but I have read that it doesn't do any good to kill 20 or 50 percent of the coyotes on your land. They just move in from contiguous property and keep on killin. Poison might be the answer, but I guarantee there will be a lot of lawsuits filed associated with the warfarin, can't say if they will be successful.

First question your going to get asked is. What are YOU doing about them. Do you trap? Do you go out and call for them.

Many deer hunters see coyotes but do not shoot them because they are afraid it is going to scare the deer away. After deer season coyotes are an afterthought. Some say you can't kill em all, I say I will kill all I see.

Agreed. I never let a predator pass.

I see posts and hear people say all the time when deer season is over... Hurry up turkey season or next deer season so I can shoot something.
Thats the time to be hunting and trapping predators.

If just 10% of the deer and turkey hunters would do it, it would make a difference.

Few years back we had a club member in his early 70's who bought a dozen or so Dp traps, 5 live traps, and 2 dozen leg holds. He caught over 90 predators. coyote, bobcat,coon,possums, feral dogs and cats in one season.
Thats a lot of mouths that ate a lot of game he took out of the equation.

A bunch of M-44 coyote getters would be a good start, but in today's world... that's never going to happen.

They are going to have to let us use snares in my opinion.

I can set at least a dozen snares before you would get one dirt hole set completed for a foot hold trap. Maybe 2 dozen snare sets if I was more practiced at it. They are easy to setup, effective and less work for the average guy to use. They are cheaper and relatively safe for wildlife with a deer lock installed on them. But let's not fool ourselves. You might catch a fawn or two and in the event you do... what about all the dead coyotes and the fawns you saved. What about catching the neighbor's dog or a stray? I don't know. See that's why they are going to say you can't use them.

I say to heck with all that. If they cared so much about the deer population they wouldn't let y'all kill one a day all season.

Getting people involved and use of snares is the only way in my opinion and I trap a good bit. I trap my place for coyotes using foothold traps and cleared out 10-15 this past year. Deer numbers were up based on our camera surveys.

Warfarin

So if you are in your stand/climber after deer season trying to shoot yotes, and the GW just happens upon you, how do you disprove that you are not hunting deer?

By not wearing hunter's orange.

And having coyote calls, and maybe a decoy in front of you, and being in full camo ...

And not sitting over a corn pile blowing a deer grunt and rattling horns. Seriously, they have to show you were doing something illegal you don't have to prove you are doing something legal. At least that's the way the law is supposed to worrk. Kind of like walking around with a gun on your side. You shouldn't have to prove you are not planning to rob a bank, they have to prove you were.

Why do people think shooting a coyote will ruin a deer hunt? Because of the sound of the rifle? What do deer do when it thunders, or someone shoots a deer on the next property, or a club member shoots a quarter mile over?

Unless you have a deer sitting right under you I don't see a rifle shot causing any issues on ruining a hunt.

Its not illegal to be in the woods with a gun, anytime. No game warden will accuse you of hunting deer unless you are very obviously hunting deer.

foam soaked in bacon grease...they can't resist it...So they say.

I keep hearing that but just don't believe it myself. I have owned dogs all my life and they have eaten every kind of foam around and never had a problem. I had one eat an entire beach towel and didn't even know it until he was running around the yard with two feet of towel hanging out the backend. I thought he had crapped out his guts but it was a towel and he was fine after it came out. I know people who have tried the sponges but I haven't seen any results.


4

well. it's illegal .

but you need to take a big piece , make it small enough to swallow whole by wrapping with a little cotton string. coyote tend to swallow big chunks , not chew like dogs from wha ive read

here you go >>>> Starbar Golden Malrin Fly Bait and burger

might want to read the MSDS on it
MSDS

Their a slave to their stomachs and you have to use that against them.

I don't like any kind of poisons. You're going to kill lots of unintentional victims.

Best time to try and reduce them is now before they start having litters. Here's my example I have 160 acre tract I've trapped for 3 years now. The first year I caught 13 off the property the next year two this year so far I've caught one. Fortunately the bulk of them have been females. In fact 11 out of them were female. The first year 9 were female now this was 3 years ago so if those 9 had a litter of 3 pups for three years that's 27 new coyotes plus the mothers equals 36.Last year 1 female using the same formula that's 7 more. Add the 1 this year so far, and you have 4 more. That's 47 coyotes I removed from that area in three years simply by trapping them out before they had young ones. That doesn't include there pups that would have litters if the females would have not been killed. I have yearlings on camera again, the turkey are showing back up and I don't have anywhere near the coyote sign I had. There are still coyotes there, but no where near a many that would be around if I hadn't done something about it. Don't wait on the state to fix the problem because it's not happening.

Good post muddyfeet. You can't slack off on them. People don't seem to realize that they can't just trap every once in a while. It must be a continuous process.

We will never wipe out the coyote but we sure can keep them under control. So y'all quit crying about the STATE needing to do something and get out there your self and make a difference!!

The Coyote hound guys keep them thinned out here. They and their dogs are good at what they do

Foam,not sponges they will pass sponges. They say close cell foam like in a mattress or craft foam.

I agree 100% about snares being the most effective way to control yotes besides poison. You can put stops on the snares to keep the animals from choking themselves down in case a fawn or pet dog gets snared.

Oh.....we would have to call in "The Management Advantage" We aren't smart enough to solve our own problems. Have to involve Chuck, so it gets done right.

To bad we cant do like New Zeland and put out some 1080 posion.

It is not hard to determine the impact.

We collect observation data on all our hunts during deer season.
Bucks, doe, fawn, unknown, turkey, hogs, predators, etc.....

We have been doing this for 3 seasons now. We trapped our coyotes hard this past spring and summer. I think Chris caught 42 and the members shot a few more.

Our observation numbers on our doe to fawn ratio improved a ton.

2014-2015 season we saw 1 fawn for every 4.3 doe.
2015-2016 season we saw 1 fawn for every 2.1 doe.

We also caught killed 319 pigs since Dec 2014.

And a bunch of coons (around a 100) and other predators.

We are going to trap our club again this year and keep doing so as long as we have the place.

put bounty on them. Here in south Louisiana there was a big nutria problem digging up all the levies. State put bounty on them and now its hard to find a nutria