Coyotes

[foxpro51]

http://pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/sports/outdoors/s_669284.html

[uncle buck]

Good article!!!!!

Studies? um.......they start checking for deer hair in scat and if they do no find it then researcher determine that coyotes are not eating deer.
 

[foxpro51]

Yes, the lack of deer is over hunting not coyotes.

[catmando]

the lack of deer is because of over hunting, with that being said ive never seen many yote turds that didnt have deer hair in it, i also found a very fresh yote kill this year ( within hours ) and caught the culprit in a trap ,  it was a 45lb red phase male

[uncle buck]

Nope their eating deer...When deer are vulnerable... However they are hunting deer 365 a year but can't catch them all the time.  However  when fawns drop or heavy snow....They are filling their bellies.......There one of them there omnivores... Mammals just like us too... wow if we find that the salmon are running or if trout are hitting on a certain stream.....Wow we are out there ASAP. Same with mammals like the coyotes too.

[scott]

when we were young we were always told domestic dogs were a huge problem for deer, that they would run them almost to exhaustion then take them down, so i am sure coyotes can do the same.   in a recent article of the eastern coyote it stated the eastern coyote's diet is 1/3 deer.  we have coyotes behind the house, this year there were a lot of mature does without fawns so much so i decide to try and call for coyotes in june to see if i could call one in.  i set the call down walked 100 yards downwind and set up.  called using fawn distress, i had two  adult does run past me and go directly to the caller, they knew the sound.   neither one of those deer had a young last with them last year.   i think the PA coyote likes the taste of deer and will take one any time of the year. 

[lonewolf]

the deer may have known the sound of a fawn in distress because it is a natural instinct and natural reaction of a doe to charge where the sound is coming from not to say they havent heard it before but its inconclusive from the reaction you witnessed to say that they reacted that way because thier young was snatched by a coyote. Deer may be 1/3 of the coyotes diet however they eat alot of road killed deer that die in the woods as well as deer that were wounded and died during the deer season. greed has the deer numbers as disgustingly low as they are thanks pa game commission

[muttbuster]

It is true that Coyotes are eating their share of deer. I have seen many dead fawns with their bellies eaten out as soon as mama doe drops them. They also eat lots of roadkill. Hunters taking poor shots from Buck fever and shooting at one on the run or hitting them in the guts. Poor shooting from some guys that shoot at any deer just to try to get lucky and hit it. I also have seen guys kill 15 doe in  one season because they can get the tags. Yep. good old fashion  greed has taken way  too many deer. This is what the game commission wanted. They got it. We also have spur of the moment disease that shows up out of no where and kills a lot of deer. Two years ago we had a bug fly all the way from Florida to Southwest Pa and land on the deer and it killed them. The woods were filled with the stench or rotting deer. The bottom line is we have very few deer in the big woods. We still have some in the suburbs only because the PAGC says you cant hunt them. Safety zones and such. The big money insurance companies are much happier now. Less deer/car collisions saves them lots of cash. I guess if I had an Insurance company I would bring in Predators, disease and bugs that can fly all the way from Florida without landing on one deer, raccoon, groundhog, skunk, fox Coyote or opossum or just rest and bite an animal for a drink of blood or what ever they eat. It's going to take a combined effort from all sportsman to bring back the deer. We also need help from the PAGC that we may or may not get. I do know that if Pa looses it's deer hunting trade, we sportsman will pick up the tab for lost revenue and taxes somewhere else.

[swarter2]

I agree with Lonewolf.  Greed is a serious issue with deer numbers.  I personally know of a group of guys that purchase well over 600, yes six hundred, antlerless tags in the 5C WMU.  Their excuse is that they need them to control the deer population.

[Crowmagnum]

Yup I agree GREED ,,,coyotes and lets not forget about them BEARS !!

[scott]

the deer may have known the sound of a fawn in distress because it is a natural instinct and natural reaction of a doe to charge where the sound is coming from not to say they havent heard it before but its inconclusive from the reaction you witnessed to say that they reacted that way because thier young was snatched by a coyote. Deer may be 1/3 of the coyotes diet however they eat alot of road killed deer that die in the woods as well as deer that were wounded and died during the deer season. greed has the deer numbers as disgustingly low as they are thanks pa game commission

oh i agree the deer herd is down because of hunting but we stopped shooting the breeding does 5 years ago and our deer herd has not grown much, what we have notices out of 20 different does on trail cam last summer only 3 of them had fawns. 2 had 1 fawn and 1 had 2 fawns.  10 years ago almost all of them would have had twins and some trips.  the deer herd is down because of the hunters but the coyotes are also keeping them down. 

[lonewolf]

problem is you can do everything in your power to manage the area you hunt but everyone next to you plays by there rules usually unethical ones

[scott]

it still doesn't explain the lack of fawns, i am starting to think that someone is slipping the does some type of birth control. 

[Buckwheat]

Scott
Is it possible the doe you have are older does now and not having young?

I have a ton of doe around my house and they do not get shot at much. I only see a few fawns every year in this group of deer. The fawns are not getting eaten by coyotes or bears either here. The big old does are the smart ones, they seam to make it through hunting season here in my yard eating everything down to the ground.

[Crowmagnum]

yup..seems diffrent depending on where you live...i believe they should go back to nothing but county doe lic. and not a certain wmu....game commission should start giving certain counties special attention instead of a wmu.counties are smaller than the management units.And I think it differs alot from county to county depending on state game lands available and so on ..years ago I used to do surveys for the game commission to try to figure the doe fawn ratio out ...all they kept saying every year is that there werent any fawns because there were to many deer,,That they wouldnt reproduce if they had to compete for food...well i didnt buy it then and i dont buy it now,not saying that this doesnt happen i just dont believe that this is a problem in pennsylvania!