Dave Martens and I have placed trail cameras in dozens of locations that have rendered great photos & videos of mountain lions.  It wasn’t always as easy as it is today for Dave to locate a lion hot spot to place a camera.  Dave’s many hours in the field and the experience that’s come with it, allow him to quickly size up a long ridge or hardpan wash bottom and hang a camera that will produce lions nearly 100% of the time. 

Some guys will say, “hey, I’ve taken lots of pictures of lions on my deer cameras on such & such waterhole”.  That’s great and we love to get pictures of lions anywhere, but keep in mind we rarely put cameras on waterholes.  We’ve had much of our success calling lions well away from waterholes and we’re more interested in how lions travel in their territories and where they go to lay-up after they’ve been to water. 

There is, however, a feature that we always look for when scouting for lions.  When we find it, our success in finding lions travelling through the area has been 100%.  That feature is scent marking areas, or as well call them, scent stations.  There are times when we locate a small area that is literally covered in a wide variety predator poo — and poo from many other critters as well.  The spot that you’ll see in the video is one such place.  Since finding this location we have taken still photos and videos of several lions, fox, bears, and other predators.  This location, which unfortunately is well off the beaten path, if called frequently will eventually produce a lion. 

Have a look at the first video of a fox, bear, and coati, using the scent station:

Then, have a look at this female lion (we’ve taken many pictures of her) and the way she behaves on the scent station:

Just like humans, where there are ladies the guys seem to just show up.   We’ve taken a few photos of lions much larger than this female that we hope to someday call.  We have worked diligently in the area to find the best places to call from and be able to see lots of open areas and tight cover.  Now it’s a matter of getting the stars to align and be there calling when one or more of the mountain lions are home. 

As always – you can subscribe to this blog for FREE by adding your email in the SUBSCRIBE box on the upper right side of this page.  Or:   

Please add your thoughts or questions in the COMMENTS section at the bottom of this page. 

Thank you all for reading and good hunting,

Mark Healy

Mark@WildlifeCallers.com

A big thank you to Doug U. of Illinois and Jason S. of Missouri for sharing their photos, calling tactics, and stories. 

Doug from IL says:

I was driving down the highway when I noticed two red fox bedding down in the middle of a snow-covered cornfield.  I pulled off the highway and made some phone calls until I figured out who owned the property.  A few phone calls later I had permission to go and call for the reds. 

I chose a downwind location to enter the field and walked to a pile of snow about 100 yards from the bedding location.  The foxes must have been asleep, because they didn’t jump and run.  I placed my Mighty Atom 15 behind the snow pile and took up a position about 80 yards away, lying down.  I started the stand with cottontail distress, nice and low.  It took the male fox just a few seconds to commit to coming in and, bang! he was running hard toward the snow pile.  The fox came ’round the snow pile full speed and wasn’t able to stop before colliding with the call and knocking it over.  While it was wondering what the heck was going on, I shot it with my .17 HMR and dropped it right to the ground. 

Doug U. of Central Illinois and his January Red Fox & Brand New Mighty Atom

I noticed the other red was standing down the field watching what was happening and I was setting up to shoot that fox too. However, the way the second fox travelled, I would be shooting toward the highway and decided to pass.  That fox eventually ran off. 

This was my very first setup with my new Mighty Atom and it worked very well.  The .17 HMR did very little damage to the fox, and it will make an outstanding mount!

Jason S. of Trenton MO told me:

He got his new Mighty Atom 21 and called his cousin, Mark, for a few quick morning coyote calling stands.  While driving down the road they spotted a coyote standing on a snowy dirt mound near a snow covered field.  They had permission to hunt the property the coyote was standing on, so they circled around and used a row of trees to get about 200 yards from the last location they saw the coyote. 

Rather than break cover and potentially being seen by the coyote, they wisely chose to stay in the trees and set the caller just a few yards in from of them.  Jason started the coyote stand with about 2 minutes of cottontail distress on low & medium volume.  He then switched the called to Fleming Hare distress and about 30 seconds later he heard Mark take the safety off on his rifle.  Jason saw the coyote coming hard from the open field toward the tree line.  The coyote came bustin’ into the timber and ran right up to the speaker.

Jason said the coyote stood about 3 to 4 steps from the speaker and didn’t know what to do next.  Jason had his crosshairs on the shoulder of the nicely furred winter dog, but waited several seconds for his cousin to take the shot first.  He waited…and waited…and waited…and finally touched off a round from his 22-250 and the coyote dropped straight down to the snow.   Jason asked Mark what the hold up was and Mark told him he was just waitin’ to see how close the coyote would actually get to the speaker.   Apparently Jason thinks 4 yards is close enough – Boom!!

Jason S. of Trenton Missouri and his January '10 Coyote & Brand New Mighty Atom Caller

We appreciate both of these gentlemen sharing their hunt stories & photos with us, but moreover their tactics and sounds they used to create successful stands. 

We wish every one of our readers much success in the field, and will continue to support your wildlife and predator calling pursuits with stories like these. 

Questions and comments are always appreciated – and don’t forget that subscriptions to this blog are always FREE. 

Good hunting!

Mark Healy

mark@wildlifecallers.com

Has the $30, $40, and sometimes $100 price tag kept you from calling with decoys on your predator stands?  Here’s a how-to guide on building an effective visual enticement, with wind powered motion, for all types of predators, and it can be done on the cheap.  We’ve included a complete parts list on this post. 

The Budget Bird Decoy w/ Goose Feather Attractor

Like most do-it-yourself projects, the Budget Bird idea started as a solution to a problem.  My brother, Mike Healy, lives near Boise, Idaho and likes to hit a few coyote stands in the afternoon near his home.  Most of the area around Boise is rolling grass prairie covered with lava rock, grass, and short/small stands of sage brush.  There is plenty of hunting pressure and there are plenty of predator callers in Boise. 

There were lots of coyotes everywhere he went, and he wasn’t having any problems getting the coyotes fired up.  However, once he had them all hot & bothered, he’d hit the prey distress and the coyotes would come just close enough to see the area/source of the sound and stop.  Some would work their way downwind, but many would just look for a few seconds and leave.  Very few would commit themselves to anything closer than 250-400 yards. 

Sound familiar?

His first stand with the Budget Bird was in a place that he’d called before and had coyotes hang up.  He and his son Carl called in two hard charging coyotes to under 30 yards and both were fixated on the Budget Bird decoy.  One even came running in from the downwind side! 

Here’s how he cured the hang-up problem:

Mike is far too cheap (uh…I mean budget minded) to just go and buy a decoy.  So, armed with a hot glue gun, some leftover paint in his garage, a horse pasture full of Canadian goose feathers, and a dove decoy from  Wal Mart, he built the Budget Bird. 

• He started with a standard gray colored dove decoy.  With left over paint he gave it a red head and an off-white body with black specks.  This coloration sufficiently matched the woodpeckers near his house. 

• So it can be mounted on a dowel rod, he hot glued a 3-inch piece of 1/2 inch PVC pipe on the bottom of the bird.  An empty shotgun shell will work here too – just glue the brass end to the decoy so the open end can fit over the dowel.

• To give the decoy some motion he drilled a hole in the tail of the decoy and added a short piece of 15lb fishing line with a clip swivel at the end (the swivel is VERY important  to avoid tangles and allow for quick feather replacement).  He then tied a short piece of fishing line to a goose feather, tied a loop on end and attached it to the swivel.  Any large feather will work. 

Because the feathers get beat up pretty easy Mike is trying a strip of material from a Tyvek envelope to see if the decoy gets the same good response from coyotes. Tyvek is tough as nails, light like a feather, and impervious to rain – it should work well, but is untested at this time. 

NOTE:  Mike told me that a guy needs to have a few different lengths of dowel rod in the truck, so the decoy can always be set up above the grass or other ground cover.  In places that have very little cover he uses a 2-foot piece.  In areas that have bushes about 2 and 3-feet high, he uses a 4 or 5-foot piece. 

ANOTHER NOTE:  The feather moves and flutters in the slightest breeze.  If the string is too long, it wraps around the dowel rod.  Also, if you don’t have the swivel in the line, the line twists right up the tail of the decoy up and will eventually cause the line to break.

Good luck to everyone with this decoy-on-the-cheap tip.  If you build one and it works for you too, we’d like to know.  Please send us the pictures!!

If you’d like to get automatic blog updates with tips like this, just subscribe in the upper right hand corner of this page.

Comments are always appreciated. 

Good hunting,

Mark Healy

mark@wildlifecallers.com

On one of my last trips to Central Arizona for a lion scouting and calling trip, I found myself, as I often do, in the middle of several gray fox.  Because my focus is calling mountain lions, I rarely shoot fox these days.  However, I’ve had some newer guys to this predator calling sport ask me to do some educational videos of animals coming to the call.  I thought this was an excellent idea. 

Arizona Gray Fox

Because my intent is not to harvest a fox, I have the unique opportunity to film the behavior of the animal from the time it arrives to the time it leaves.  Also, while I have the fox in the area of the caller, I have the opportunity to use the sounds from my Wildlife Technologies caller to capture and keep the attention of the animal for long periods of time.  The result is video that shows people some basic ways to scout for and to call a fox, but the video clips also demonstrate how animals respond to being called and what happens during various sound changes on the caller. 

In this video I call in a very vocal fox that comes in fast, stays for a long time, and puts on a great show. 

If you are a photographer or hunter (archery, handgun, shotgun, or rifle), there were many opportunities to get shots at this fox.

By the way… 

The high-pitched whistling noise that you hear from the caller is a juvenile cougar vocalization.  You might have thought that playing mountain lions sounds would have scared an eight-pound fox away.  Not so.  You’ve got to love the tenacious manner of the gray fox. 

Your comments are always welcome and questions can be directed to me personally at:  mark@wildlifecallers.com

Free blog updates are available by subscribing or registering for the blog!!

As always – good calling and hunting to everyone,

Mark Healy

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While in the field recently, I was working my way along a decomposed granite road looking for lion tracks and other lion sign, when I came across the tracks in the photo below:

Fox Tracks on Tire Marks

When I found these fox tracks I noticed right away that they were right on top of a tire track, indicating that they were at least more recent than that tire track. I took some time to evaluate the tire track the fox had walked on and found the tire track was on top of all the other tracks on the road, thus it was from the last vehicle to drive through.  The area is fairly well travelled and my best guess was that the vehicle had passed through the prior evening. 

Realizing that the fox tracks were just a few hours old, I set up my Wildlife Technologies electronic caller in a rocky canyon running adjacent to the roadway.  I sat about 20-25 yards from the caller and used a Cannon GL video camera to get the following footage of the fox coming in and hanging out. 

I used different sounds to manipulate the fox and get it to stay near the speaker for more than a minute.  It’s worth mentioning that this fox saw me turning the camera to my right, and was very aware of my presence.  Keeping the sound playing without pauses and making the changes that I did to the sound is key in keeping the fox focused.  This fox could have easily been photographed or taken by a hunter.

Far too many callers miss these field clues and end up calling what looks good to them, rather than calling an area that is obviously target rich.  Scout carefully and call where the critters are!  This fox started his approach in just a few seconds of the caller being turned on – I was in his living room. 

I am editing another video that shows more grey fox behavior and how a predator caller can manipulate the animal being called for better shots with a camera, bow, or gun.  Stay tuned for that. 

As always, we welcome your comments. 

I’ll see you in the field,

Mark Healy

Send your questions to mark@wildlifecallers.com