Stormy weather shouldn't keep you home.

Pre-storm and post-storm weather are some of the best times to get out after predators. While not always the most comfortable (i.e. cold, windy, and crappy) predators are often out and on the hunt, eager to come to the call.

I had to do a skinning demo last night for a group of youth, and so despite the stormy weather, I headed out yesterday afternoon in pursuit of predators. While the first 3 stands were a bust, mostly thanks to gail force winds, I soon discovered a nice big canyon hidden from the casual observer. I knew this was my ticket to success, even though it was about a mile hike to get into the canyon. The wind had died down a bit, but the casual rain drop was still falling every now and then.

I setup on the first stand with a good view of my downwind, and in less than 2 minutes I had a fox on stand right in my downwind. Bang, flop, and the skinning demo was on for sure. Not wanting to quit, I headed farther into the canyon and setup again. And this is when things got interesting.

My stand was overlooking a large rocky wash so that I could see both ends of the canyon coming into where I was calling from. Just a few minutes in I get a hard charging fox. The wind had picked up and I was getting darn cold by this point . . . . but those are just excuses for what comes next - I shot low in my excitement to have two animals for the kids to skin! But the fox casually hopped behind a rock, and I was sure he was still around so I stuck it out. Sure enough, he pops up on my right, looking around. But as I move for the shot, he disappears again. I know he's behind me, so I decide to throw caution to the wind and go tactical on this fox. I turn and low-crawl over a couple of rocks, and as I come up over the last boulder, there he stands, not 20 feet away, looking right at me. He's in front of a small bush, so he must've felt hidden and safe, because he didn't run. Either way, my rifle comes up and I smash a 55gr VMAX into his chest, he flips over backwards, but he's still kicking around so I smash another round into him. I think he was dead after the first round, but I've seen enough animals run away to know that you shoot until they stop moving.

He was a bit of a small fox, and the rounds did some terrible damage, so he didn't come back for the skinning and I didn't feel that a picture was warranted. But here's the picture of the one that got skinned last night by a very excited group of kids:



The young ladies were especially excited to participate, and it was a lot of fun as after he was skinned the kids wanted to dissect him and help me prep the skull for cleaning. Good times were had by all.

And a couple of lessons were re-learned:

1) Just 'cause the weather isn't perfect, doesn't mean the animals won't come in.

2) Everyone still gets excited about making the shot, even after shooting lots of animals!

Happy Hunting!

Double Check the Shady Spots

Bird distress had drawn nothing in for the last two stands, so I decided to try something new. About 10 minutes into the next stand, I switched to fox distress, and not 10 seconds later caught movement to my left - but whatever it was, it was leaving! Giving me only a few glances at what I thought to be a gray fox, it was gone in a few dashes through the shade and random openings between bushes on the far hillside, at least 200 yards away.

Another 5 minutes passed without anything else happening, so I whistled to my hunting partner and good friend, Eric, that the stand was over. As we headed away from the stand and down the canyon, I scanned the hillside, looking for any sign that what I had seen had been real and not imagined, or not some bird fluttering from bush to bush. Suddenly, I spotted something in the shade - it looked like a set of ears outlined against the hillside. It was about 150 yards away and just slightly uphill from where I had seen movement earlier. I stopped and looked hard, waiting for movement. Oh nevermind - it was just a branch. As Eric and I walked on, closer and closer to the branch, I kept my eyes on it. Something about that big branch looked too much like an animal, but in the shade and the early morning light it was hard to tell. Finally I asked Eric for his rifle, which was scoped with a variable optic, since I only had my shotgun. As I shouldered the rifle, there in the crosshairs stood a gray fox, staring down at us!

I can only guess that he felt very confident in his concealment, since he still didn't move, even though he was only 120 yards away and technically in the open. I say to Eric "That's a fox!" Eric replies that he wants to shoot him, so I hand the rifle back to Eric, who got into a steady position, adjusted the scope . . . . and still the fox did not move. Amazing!

Eric flipped the safety off and with a solid shot dropped the fox. We had to do some bushwhacking and serious uphill climbing to get to it, but what we found was a beautiful and fairly large fox - I'd say the biggest one I have seen all season! It was a good shot by Eric, shooting uphill at a steep angle at about 120 yards, and just as interesting to see was that the fox didn't budge the entire time, until Eric shot him, of course.

So what is the lesson that is to be learned here? There are several, actually:

-Always double-check that "stump bobcat", "rock fox", or "bush coyote", because it just may be a real animal! They are masters of concealment, since that's how they survive and hunt.

-Spend more time looking in the shade when you are scanning your area while on stand. This isn't the first time I have killed or seen killed a predator who had snuck in and was sitting in the shade, surveying the situation and deciding on his next move, perfectly concealed.

-Sitting in the shade and not moving is amazingly good concealment, even better than whatever fancy camo Cabela's is currently selling.

-Invetigate areas where you saw movement while on stand. You may find sign of what was there, such as scat or tracks. And maybe the animal will still be standing in those tracks!

-When you are done calling, get up slowly, look around, and leave the stand quietly. You don't know what may still be approaching or watching. I have bagged several predators just by taking the same amount of time and care leaving a stand as I did approaching it.

-Like I've always said, foxes are crazy! They will stick around through just about anything, and just like this one did, they'll often give you a second chance if you screwed up the first one.

-This is the third fox this season that I have seen run away from fox distress, and I have heard from other hunters that they have been having similar results. This is interesting, since fox distress is usually a sure bet for calling foxes. I'll keep an eye on this trend, as it would change the way that foxes are called since it may be an indicator that foxes can be educated to a sound to the point where they would no longer come to it.


It was a fun morning, and the best part of a hunt is getting to share it with someone else. I'm glad that Eric was there to take this shot!

ShootersRealm.com

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Happy Hunting!