Out of the Woods

By Mike Osterhout

I'm sitting at the typewriter, gazing out the window at two chocolate colored llamas munching on frost-coated grass, bobbing their long necks, pricking their ears at every passing car. I catch some movement in the far end of the paddock. A black coyote is creeping across the field. The llamas pay him no mind, but the kid goats begin to cry. Luckily their pen is too formidable for the coyote and it looks like he already knows this because he doesn't hesitate at the sound of the cries, but continues up and over the hill. A heron sets its wings and drops into the duck pond, while two prehistoric looking emus wander back and forth across the field. The sun tops the trees and as it sweeps the meadow-the frost melts like butter in a hot pan.

At this point you're probably wondering what I've been smoking this morning. But I swear on my laminated NY Press Association card this is my actual view out the front window. An old chicken farm that became a dairy farm that turned into a horse farm has presently been purchased by a young couple who are obviously creative in their choice of livestock. I've heard talk of camels, giraffes, ostrich and wouldn't be too surprised to see a penguin ice skating across the duck pond in January. I've never farmed and have no interest in raising livestock, but as a spectator to this budding game farm I whole-heartedly approve of the furry and feathered exotica moving into the neighborhood.

I can only imagine what that coyote is telling his buddies back at the den-turkeys five foot tall? 300-pound deer? 50-pound house cats! There's been a steady increase of coyote sightings and game, livestock and house pet loss over the past couple of years. I shot a few, but always while hunting something else (usually turkey). The more you sound like a turkey the better chance you have of being hunted yourself. I once had a big female come so close to my back. I smelled her before I saw her. As I turned she nonchalantly disappeared into the brush. An hour later she returned to my calls for the last time. Her pelt hangs on my porch.

Hunting this predator is one of the toughest challenges you can undertake in the Northeast. Coyote season runs from October 1 to mid-March, but outside of the chance encounters I've mentioned, the best time to hunt them is in the dead of winter. At the time of year when that big buck is a distant memory, the holidays are over, you've read every magazine in the house and a foot of snow covers the ground, the one game animal left to hunt is the 'yote. Take the eyesight of a turkey, the sense of smell of a deer and the adaptability and survival instincts of both combined and you come close to realizing how hard it is to hunt these wary animals.

One winter I seriously went after the beast after finding one too many piles of turkey feathers and scraps of deer hide. A pack had been running the ridges and swamps and judging from the tracks there were over a dozen wrecking havoc in the woods. I had been practicing with my rabbit squealer (trying to sound like a dying rabbit), reading predator hunting books and listening to calling tapes. Donning a pair of old white overalls, my warmest boots and gloves, I grabbed my .243 and started following the tracks. It was five degrees below and cloudy. A half an hour out the door it started to snow, I pined for those 65-degree days of bow season. Two hours later the tracks had filled with fresh snow and I was a couple of miles from home. I hadn't seen as much as a squirrel.

It was starting to get dark and I knew I had to head back but I set up one last time. Plopping down into a snow drift I let loose with a series of blood curdling screams. I caught a glimpse of movement. I stopped calling and squinted through the snow. It was a deer. Then as I prepared to blow my last series of calls a beautiful silver coyote stepped into a clearing not 30 yards in front of me. In one movement I raised the .243 to my knee, clicked off the safety and fired. Snow exploded just over his back as he vanished in a white cloud. I had made the cardinal mistake in hunting. Not expecting to see anything I had relaxed my guard and been unprepared when that coyote offered me an easy shot. I reacted in haste, jerking the trigger and shooting right over his back. The rest of that winter I hunted that pack without ever seeing fur again.

Last night as I came out of the woods I heard the pack howling a chorus of yips and yelps. I've shot a couple since that winter but I'm sure I haven't put a dent in the population. Many see coyotes as worthless varmints that should be exterminated. I do not. Like deer, their numbers should be intelligently managed. As a game animal they are right at the top of my list. This winter when only the emu's heads are sticking through the snow and that penguin is doing pirouettes on the duck pond, I'll try again.