Russell Brown | California
Recently, a good friend of mine was visiting from Las Vegas for the weekend. We went out early one of the mornings to do some calling near Bakersfield, California. We made several stands and had zero action. On the fifth stand we had four or five coyotes come in hard to our right, but I was not able to see them because, like a dummy, I was laying prone with my AR and my view was perfectly blocked by a bush. As usual, the coyotes didn't come in from the direction I thought they would. My buddy didn't want to shoot in front of me towards them, so those dogs got a pass for another day. My eardrums certainly appreciated that!
By this point, it was getting pretty warm out and we were both feeling a little discouraged and tired. However, we went ahead and made the drive out to a spot that has been pretty good to us in years past. We walked in and set up. Honestly, I didn't think we would see anything as we were both being about as quiet as elephants. My rifle clanked my shooting sticks twice and my buddy was doing something behind me with the dead bushes to clear a shooting lane. Yet, less than three minutes after starting the e-caller, a coyote came bursting out of the brush line 65-70 yards in front of us. I dropped my head down to my scope and he was lined up perfectly — no fiddling with the sticks or struggling to line him up. He slowed down, I fired and down he went! He was rolling around a bit so I put another Black Hills/Barnes bullet in him for good measure, even though it was probably not necessary. Hey, it's only money right? Stupid lead ban...
After that we decided to end things on a positive note and we hung it up for the day. We had a lot of fun, not to mention a good bit of joking around and reminiscing. It was a great day and one I will cherish all the more because we don’t get to hunt much together since my friend moved to Sin City. For me, this hunt really embodied one of the greatest things about hunting — spending time in the field with friends!
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