Here is a look at the location.

Notice once again the set is in the wide open.

A shallow drainage enters from the left. A narrow corridor leads off to the right.

A younger female preceded her at this set. Another jip was taken only yards away three days prior.

Her choppers were a little deceiving. They had some interesting wear.
The k-9’s were still long but were really rough on the tips.

Notice the upper right large incisor and the extreme wear it caused on the front of the right lower k-9.

Lower incisor wear is substantial as were the rear molars.
I do not believe the teeth on this coyote reflect its age as most do.

Ears can indicate age in many ways.

Notice how the ear looks thin and beat up on the edges.

The portrait of this adult female speaks for itself.

In this case I feel the overall facial, ear, and body features tell a more accurate story on age..

I would put this old girl at probably six and maybe even seven years old.

I used to think we didn't have the older dogs around here. Thought they didn't make it that long. But as i got better at catching them I started getting a few. They are on a different level than yearlings even two year olds but they are out there. I still have problem coyotes that give me fits and i'm sure it's the old smart gals.

Tejas, do you think the K-9's are rough from wear or from biting the trap? I've seen quite a few roughed up K-9's from some getting aggressive with the trap.

I thought the same thing at first SPC, so i checked it out. After taking a closer look I am certain she wasn't biting the trap.
There were not any marks on the levers, and her teeth and gums were fine. Usually they will hit on the premolars and they will fail.
Most of the coyotes I see bite are high strung.She was super calm the whole time.
The bottom right K-9 has debris stuck in it that you can somewhat see in the photo. I have only seen that in older coyotes with more k-9 wear.

Here is another interesting thing I have noticed over the years.
Offhand, I cannot recall ever seeing a female bite on a trap, or show signs of biting after they are loaded up.
I have only seen that behavior in certain males. Around here, the girls seem to handle stress a little better than their male counterparts do.
I take note of highly aggressive individuals. There are not many females on that list, so I probably would remember one chewing on a trap.
Perhaps it is just a local thing. If someone has seen this, I would certainly like to hear about it.

Yep, that's what I noticed. It's the high, strung one's biting the trap. I've never paid real close attention to if it was male or a female doing it. I thought I've seen both do it at times, but I'll pay closer attention to it now and see what the results are.

I noose and box all my coyotes so I didn’t get to examine and teeth.i have had some females with the pad gone off the trap foot that I layed to her chewing at the trap. I can almost always tell the. Female from male when I pull up the female fight me the whole time even trying to noose her.Now the biggest males I caught that I thought were going to be a problem was not they would lay there. The smaller males were feisty.

Things To Avoid When Digging A Trap Bed


The trap bed is the foundation of the coyote set.
I see three miscues repeated over and over again.
In most cases, the bed is cut too big, too deep, and at a sloping angle to the trap.
Those factors can have a huge impact on overall effectiveness.

Digging the bed too deep and wide can lead to excess settling, leaving a depression or exposed trap.
If a bed is dug at a shallow angle it is very susceptible to an errant swipe or paw though loose dirt which will easily snag the trap.
If digging starts and loose dirt is encountered the excavation is likely to continue.

A big area of loose dirt on an otherwise hard surface will be noticed underfoot.
The bigger the disturbed area, the more noticeable the visual contrast.
Blending & duffing in can only do so much.

The less ground disturbance the better.

When cutting the bed outline, chisel at a 90 degree angle to the ground surface.

You want the bed to drop directly off from hardpan to trap bed.

This helps guard against random swipes, digs, & pawing at the set.

Cut the bed to fit the trap.

The coyote should feel hardpan under his paw all the way to the trap outline.

A soft bed of dirt will be added to the bottom for the trap to rest in.

Fill will be added to bring the trap as level with the surface as I can get

A narrow channel is cut to lay loose chain, swivels, & D-Ring.

The cross frame also fits well in this groove.

This makes for a rock steady trap that wont budge.

Pilot hole is drilled to 12”with anchor driven to same depth.

When anchor is set it probably rests at 10.5” give or take.

Good photos and advice, newbies should take note of this as it's a proper way to bed a trap...in that environment.

Great tutorial James !! I learned that the hard way unfortunately lol ! I would cut a big cone in the ground make the trap solid then fill in and pack it in. I was disturbing waaaay too much ground and definitely resulted in more dug up traps early on.

Catch a spring bred female, or a female that’s already whelped here and there won’t be an intact tooth left in their head.

They will work and work and work the trap, the chain, and anything else they can reach, absolutely blow the catch circle up, and fight till the end.

If you got a weak spot they’ll find it!

H e l l hath no fury sort of thing.

Boone,I do not doubt that for a second. That makes perfect sense to me.
I'll have to go through my photo records, as it is painfully apparent when they have been hammering the trap.
I usually make note of aggressive behavior in the written record as well.

I've trapped a healthy number of big adult females well past breeding season over the years.
I just do not recall any exhibiting that frantic behavior post breeding in this specific area.
I don’t recollect any obvious signs of bleeding or broken choppers on the ones I came across.
All adults are checked for tooth wear.

What I do remember is having a good number of adult females caught right in the middle of the rut.
You could tell those girls wanted OUT in a bad way!
I didn’t witness trap chewing or any signs of it, but instead they chose to focus primarily on the caught foot below the jaw.

I only remember seeing this during the rut. It was almost exclusively adult females, but I do remember some big males doing that as well.
I know a rutting male can get hyper-focused on the prize, so I can see why they would fight like heck to get loose.
No younger coyotes showed signs of that behavior.

Thanks fellas

Hopefully it will help a trapper or two reel in a few problem children and prevent creating more of the same.

I wanted to reiterate the importance of the way the bed is cut.
This simple step can really cut back on mayhem and increase your catches.

When a trap bed is cut to size at a 90° it somewhat guards against negative interaction.
A swipe or paw is more likely to contact the hard surface around the trap bed protecting the softer bed dirt.
A dig on hardpan will be short lived in most cases. A exploratory dig on a soft surface is highly likely to continue.

The digging tool you use makes a big difference in what your bed ends up looking like

You cannot cut a precise bed like this with a clunky wide chisel 3 lb. hammer.
The wide/thick blade tends to break up the 90° edge which is crucial to guarding the trap.
The masonry hammer retains most of that sharp edge.

I have used a masonry hammer from day one.
It has a straight chisel that is narrow for much more precise cuts.
Chisel strikes do not kick dirt in your face like the angled chisel with the wide blade.