Yes Jimmy, these are rolling hills and position 2 is at the top of a hill. The woods behind position 2 are at a much lower elevation. It's a pretty steep bank. If you will also notice that the trees that are shown to the north of (or behind) possition 2 are dark. These aireal photos were taken in April of 1994. There were no leaves on the trees yet in New Hampshire in April, so the dark trees are pines, hemlocks and some spruces - evergreens if you will - and the forest floor there is very open. Great visability. The path the coyotes have taken in the past, represented by the orange arrow and line is really along a trail that connects the two fields. There is a barb wire fence running along side the orange arrow to the left of it also. They come right up that bank, and they do it so silently that one minute you are staring at trees and the next you are looking at a coyote 35 yards away. It freeks people out when they bust over the top of the hill and just stand there inside the tree line trying to make up their minds what to do. And they usually do just stand there for a few seconds - looking.
In most cases, when I hunt this area I usually take someone with me. I always let them sit at position 1 because I am pretty sure they will have some action there. At position 2 I have a better view of the opposite side of the field, and since this is where they travel and cross, I will sometimes see them come out to work the edge down to where they cross the field. Where the blue line that crosses the filed is, there is a slight depression, and they use this to go across the field.
I have never seen or heard of one of my partners seeing a coyote come from directly south of position 1. Part of this is because this path in to the fields is used quite heavily by snow machines and 4 wheelers. The blue line that runs just south of our path in runs along part of a creek bed, and they travel this all year long.
The area just below the orange x is a field and below that it is pretty swampy - usually always wet. But where that small field is below the x there is a strip of trees that they use. They hardly ever just cross open ground here. They always find something to give them cover even if they have to go farther to get to where they want to go.
So what I am trying to do here is to use the terrain to my advantage, and the paths the coyotes take as well. They seem to run in the low spots. And when they come to a call, they never just bust into a field, they always get to the edge and look first. They may be back a few yards in the brush and you may just see a head and ears, but they are there looking.
So, I hope that explains it some from my perspective. Now, about those spots you said you might work - give it up /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif
What might you do and where might you set up - I am always open for suggestions for as I said on another board, sometimes I think these old coyotes use me to train their pups /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif I hate being a sucker /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif
