Photographing coyotes

[Wallie]

The wolves have taken a terrible toll on the coyotes in YNP over the years. There numbers are no where near what they were before the wolves were introduced.
If you want to see coyotes you can drive down my street on Thursday mornings before daylight, it’s garbage day and the hit the garage cans every week

 

[PhilcTx]

Now home in upstate NY, I’m still hoping to find and photograph coyotes doing interesting things, and I’m wondering if anyone else has suggestions about how to locate and approach coyotes, especially in the eastern U.S. I know they’re here (and almost everywhere) as I see them occasionally while driving, but would like to know how I might improve my chances of success.

Borrow the tactics of coyote hunters.

Determine a location they're known to frequent. Use a "caller" - essentially an audio playback device that uses recordings of sounds of common injured prey of coyotes. Typically rabbits squealing, etc. There's many callers available commercially but with a little creativity can be made at home. The animals-in-distress recordings were available online with some searching if you build your own.

Position the caller out in open. Then position and conceal yourself downwind of the caller so the 'yotes are less likely to catch your scent as they come in to investigate the caller. Some commercial callers even have a feather, ribbon, fur, etc on a motorized wire that periodically twists to mimic injured prey movement.

 

[MrFotoFool]

Borrow the tactics of coyote hunters.

Determine a location they're known to frequent. Use a "caller" - essentially an audio playback device that uses recordings of sounds of common injured prey of coyotes. Typically rabbits squealing, etc. There's many callers available commercially but with a little creativity can be made at home. The animals-in-distress recordings were available online with some searching if you build your own.

Position the caller out in open. Then position and conceal yourself downwind of the caller so the 'yotes are less likely to catch your scent as they come in to investigate the caller. Some commercial callers even have a feather, ribbon, fur, etc on a motorized wire that periodically twists to mimic injured prey movement.

This is assuming you do not find this unethical, which I personally do and would never use.

 

[Lee R]

This is assuming you do not find this unethical, which I personally do and would never use.

Probably just saved that Coyote from a hunter by teaching it how not to be fooled tbh. They won't get that chance with a hunter.

They're extremely skittish where I grew up in Maine since a lot of people will shoot them on site as they have a reputation for taking down the deer and domestic animals/chickens cats dogs and whatever they can get. The northeastern coyotes are significantly larger than the western ones. They killed a 19 year old girl hiking in Nova Scotia a decade ish ago. Someone actually took pictures of the pair that they think was responsible just minutes before it happened.

 

[Gaduf]

As many may already know, I am a cotton farmer by trade and a photographer by passion. I carry the camera with me most of the time in my truck but also in my tractor and sprayers. In my truck you cannot get within a quarter mile of a coyote and if you do get closer it is closer it is always a picture of their butt running away from you. However when on a tractor or sprayer things change drastically as they are not fearful of the tractors and sprayers. I guess these are too slow for them to fear. This leads me to a couple of stories.

A few years ago, I found a Coyote Den in the middle of a cotton field. The pups were coming out of the hole but if i got too close they would run back in the hole. For two weeks, i would go to that field on the tractor with the sprayer on it and i would move 27 feet closer each morning just after sunrise. I got to know those coyotes pretty well. Two of the pups would go into the den as soon as they saw me. Then two of the pups were the bravest and they seemed more curious and they were always the last ones to go into the den. Every day i went and would stop when I got where the sun was directly behind me and would open the cab door so they could see me. On the final day i went there i stopped and started shooting and ended up getting off the tractor and started moving towards them and got about 20 feet closer before they ran into the den. The den went into and old 16 inch concrete line that had been used to transport water but was abandoned. Below are three photos of the encounter. It was a lot of fun.

In the final picture, I was planting the outside of a center pivot irrigation system. I got to one of the corners and saw three coyotes hunting a small area for insects, mice and such. I stopped the tractor and turned the tractor off as not to scare them off. I opene the cab door and just sat in the tractor very still. I saw one jumping from pile to pile trying to scare something up. A pregnant female starting moving straight towards the tractor. As she was moving within about 50 feet of the tractor I raised the camera up and start shooting. She seemed more curious than cautious.

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Lovely images and detailed background information on these predators that I was not familiar with.
We have Jackals in my part of the world which are somewhat similar.
You 1st image is a gem.
Gavin

 

[Chappy]

Lovely images and detailed background information on these predators that I was not familiar with.
We have Jackals in my part of the world which are somewhat similar.
You 1st image is a gem.
Gavin

Thank you.