In my book, killing one coyote carries the same point value as killing five hogs.

Killing a female coyote calls for a beer or 12.

Had one after my chickens this morning, wish I could have gotten a shot on him.

That’s a big one!

Looks like a big 'Ol East Texas 'Yote'.

Nearly all of mine look like that.

The ones we had in the Tularosa Basin of New Mexico were mostly little fellas, not much bigger than the desert foxes.

I don’t shoot them. I know that they prey on deer but, since I now have a helluva lot more pigs than deer, I figure they are my only ally. Nor do I allow anybody who visits to shoot them.

That is crazy. They are fawn and yearling killers.

Most definitely. Studies have found that coyotes are responsible for 90% of fawn mortality in areas where they live. In other words, if you have coyotes, 9 out of every 10 fawns that don't make it were killed and eaten by coyotes. Or more simply put, there are fawn killing machines.

As for feral hogs, my approach has always been to kill the producing sows and let the coyotes I never see and other predators work on their young.

Pigs and Yotes always at first sight. No matter what time of year or day.

Shoot every dang one of them!

The highest density of yotes I’ve ever seen was Webb county, it’s also top 3 BC entry county in Texas….. maybe they are doing what most people won’t and controlling carrying capacity densities in a good way.

Been thinking that way for many years now.

It makes sense when you think about it.

The yote culling studies down there are pretty interesting. Virtually ineffective due to such high dispersal once a dominate pack is removed. Add in it’s not like west where aerial gunning is very effective and you have pretty limited legal removal means.

That's an interesting perspective.

It would be number one if they were shooting and trapping coyotes.......

How legally effective can you be with 5 strand fence at truley controlling them.

You and I have one off about it before. Webb is crazy with yotes and I think it helps and you do too . But take Pecos and mule deer that typically has lower fawn recruitment in general and I think it crushes the MD.

So which fawns are these selective yotes killing? Which rutted down mature bucks are they killing? I'll wait for your answers. To many coyotes is never a good thing. They are not selective. Most people are to lazy to manage their place so they use the coyote as a crutch to keep numbers down for them. A coyote is never selective...remember that statement next time you pass one.

There is no discrimination, just best opportunity, with that said best habitat that provides the most tonnage will be the one that is continually under utilized. The fawn predation will be exponentially higher than adult predation. Fawn predation has greater effect on overall herd health than the vastly smaller number randomized post prime adults.

I’m not saying don’t shoot yotes, I’m saying if you arent intensely managing herd and predator numbers all around, the random inefficiency of occasionally shooting yotes doesn’t do much, and in some instances helping you

Let’s be honest when it comes to you , you are the anomaly in management. There may be 1-2 other people out of 85k on this forum that have the time and resources to actually manage habitats and herd like you do. It’s your life. What you do 365 days a year. Most ranchers don’t even put much effort in yotes. If they did Webb of all places would be void of them.

And Webb county is still a 3 buck county.

I know of a 800 acre HF place in Webb County that had a horrible fawn crop for years....I am talking 5% to 10%...10% was a great year for them. They ranch a small cow/calf herd also. Their total deer herd numbers were starting to decline even with limited hunting pressure due to lack of fawn crops. IIRC their ratio was 1:2 bucks/doe. They started snaring coyotes and went after them hard everyday for 2 yrs. After two year they averaged 1 coyote per day in snares...so over 700 coyotes off of 800 acres that was surrounded by a couple of larger ranches and some smaller ranchitos. Their fawn numbers went from 10% on a great year to 80%-90% per year for two years. They now were overwhelmed with huge fawn crops and lot of deer had to be killed just remain at their target numbers. They were struggling with have to kill more deer than they had tags for...no MLD. What did they do..they stopped snaring and within a couple of years fawn crops went back down to where they had been. They went back to shooting all they could and doing selective snaring from late Jan till Juneish. You will never kill coyotes down to where you have none in South Texas. I know of a very large ranch in Panhandle that flew a helicopter for 5 days and killed over 1500 coyotes on 100+k acres....the next year they could not tell they had put a dent in them. They had light deer numbers to begin with but there problem was with livestock predation.

It's a constant battle. You can shoot 75% of them off a place in a single day and without taking any additional numbers during the year, you will be right back where you started at the end of the year.

Best time to get after them is late March.

I shoot them, I trap them. I snare them. I do things that some may think is not legal to kill them. But there are always more. You folks that think they are a great tool at wildlife management are kidding yourselves and looking like fools.

Look like fools? You mean comparing freerange deer to goat pens?

Free range Deer management isn’t goat pens. I see why you think that and continue to allude to it but it is a very narrow scoped view. You don’t have an over population of goats, you just take them to the sale. If you didn’t cull them year to year annuli growth would be significantly impacted if you weren’t doing serious supplementation. Only way for you to maintain a health herd would be predator if younger mouths.

No body said it was a great management tool, just it takes up alot of slack in population control of deer.

The Webb county example has been pretty consistent over decades. As long as yote populations are high something is supporting it. Been that way for decades in Webb and it still produces giants.

Grand reality is very few places are managed the way you think and way STXranchman actually does

I’ve had to put down several cows and heifers that had a calf get hung up and yotes got on them or yotes pulled or got to the calf and ate it. I have no love for yotes, but only a fool thinks you and go shoot a few yotes from the truck and call it yote management.

Pretty much the theme. Ranch south of mine on TX side of Panhandle that flies every year in spring. Pretty consistent y2y yote numbers. Ranch is too big to run snares ethically or economically. We can’t file around my place due to state law.

Pretty much have in hand, stop deer dispersal better stop your predator dispersal in