Blew It On A Wolf - Season 5.....

Chas

Chas

CGN frequent flyer
GunNutz
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Location
N.E. Ont - home of the Concrete Goose
You may have seen my previous posts about Gunner410 and my hunting experiences while wolf hunting since 2009 along the north shore of Lake Superior, and how it usually works out in the wolfs favour. Well, here we go again for another season.......

Well so far, things have been rather slow. No wolves seen and track numbers would indicate that the population is way down compared to when we started 5 years ago. Our moose population is way down as well. Gunner410 saw lots of wolf sign when moose hunting on a buddies trapline this fall, but the area is not accessible to us now due to snow depths and now plowed roads in the area. That and the bottom falling out of the thermometer haven’t produced the most conducive hunting opportunities so far this year.

On Christmas Eve, Gunner410, Paddle2DaC, and I headed out to our favourite powerlines to set up. It was clear, wind free and cold, -28 and who knew that would seem like a heat wave based on the temps we have had since then!

We were using Gunner410’s Turbo Dogg caller and I set out a raven decoy and a “quiver critter” rabbit decoy and started calling. Within a couple of minutes, a large hawk (at first I thought it was an owl) immediately comes out of the treeline and swooping down the hydro line heading for the call. It pulled up and sat on a poplar tree on edge of the powerline watching the quiver critter. It then swooped down off the tree and buzzed the decoy and then into the trees on the other side of the power line. The three of us were all thinking the same thing – there goes the stuffed decoy and we had a good chuckle over this as we were picking up.

Although we didn’t see anything at this set, we then hiked over to an adjacent powerline. I set Paddle2DaC to the west of me and Gunner 410 to the east on me and put out the caller and quiver critter in the middle of the line. After calling for 6 or 7 minutes, an adult lynx walked out of the treeline between Paddle2DaC and me. It walked directly over to the TurboDogg and started sniffing it. After a minute or so, it turned and walked over to the quiver critter. I flicked the safety off of my Valmet 12 gauge /.222 figuring I would blast the shotgun in the air if it decided to leave with the decoy. The lynx walked up to the decoy, sniffed it, and then walked out to the middle of the powerline and sat there catching some rays. It turned and started walking back towards my side of the treeline. I moved and it stopped, looked at me and started to trot towards me. When it was 20 yards away, it turned into the bush and disappeared. Paddle2DaC never saw it as he was watching only to the west. When I picked up the gear, I showed him the tracks in the snow and we walked back to Gunner410. He was laughing and told us that while he was sitting at his location, he turned and there was the lynx sitting 15 feet behind him, growling at him! He lip squeaked at it and it continued to growl at him, before sneaking back into the bush.

I went back on Boxing day with my wife and tried there again to see if I could get the lynx to come out, but no joy. She was a trooper as the wind came up and it was cold and blowing snow. First time she ever came out with me.



We went out yesterday, but at -33 it wasn’t the nicest of days to hunt. We did some scouting and located a pack of at least 4 animals. We have some bait out and my game camera set up so hope to have some pictures soon.

I realize it’s a long post, thanks for reading it and Happy New Years!
 
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Keep it up. -33? That's a heatwave compared to the -37 my truck thermometer showed this a.m. in southern MB. Best of luck as a called in wolf (or any wolf) is a trophy amongst trophies.
 
Likewise, the temperature here has been - 37 for the last three mornings. A grainy picture of a fisher on the beaver carcass on January 1 but thats it. Even trail cameras dont like these temps!
 
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Good story. I'm hoping to get out this weekend but we have sustained -40 air temp or colder for two weeks now. Windchill hit -75 last night so unless it warms a little...... not going to happen unfortunately.
 
Great story, at least your getting to see some wildlife around. Ive spent many a day without barely seeing a squirrel. Good luck next time.
 
Wolf hunting has been very slow so far. We have been in severe weather conditions – when it is not bone numbing cold it is snowing heavily. Last week, I went out to one of my stands – it had been -30C or colder all of the previous week and little has been moving. I set up along one power line and called with no response. I walked up to where I had set the caller and was playing with some wolf calls at a loud volume to check distortion (I have yet to find a wolf call that does not distort at high volume). I packed it up and started walking to where I have a trail cam when a couple of wolves started howling back from across the hydro line. I set back up and tried again, but nothing showed itself. It had been so cold that the SD card popped out of the trail camera and I had no pictures for the week.

I headed out west of town and found a fresh road killed bull moose that someone had taken the fron t quarters and antlers off of. There were a lot of ravens, but not a wolf track there, or anywhere along the 50 km stretch that I checked. I snowshoed into a long meandering beaver flood where Gunner410 and I blew it on a pack of 6 two Christmas’ ago, and not a track. Not hard to figure out why, I am 6’ 4” and I was sinking between my knees and my thigh in snow, with snowshoes. I fell once, and could not reach down through the snow to the ground.

I went back to the road kill the next day with my truck, and carved off the hinds and head, and took them to the beaver flood for bait. After dragging them in over three trips in that snow, I was soaked and done for the day. Still no wolf tracks anywhere, even where the moose were wandering near the road. Gunner 410 went out to check the site mid week and no tracks at the bait, or where the remains of the road kill were located. Then it started snowing and we got another 6 inches of snow.

This morning it was -25 and calm, and I had fresh tracks of 3 wolves near the trail camera, but nothing came out to the calls. One showed at the bait in front of the trail cam last night, and a lynx has been a regular visitor as well. Finally some action at this site.





I then went to a second site along a snowmobile trail along a power line. This is where I had a lynx come out on Christmas Eve (and which growled at Gunner410 – showing it had good judgement of character). I set the caller about 50 yards west of me at the base of a small birch tree which I positioned an Avery raven decoy in. I put a Promos sit and spin decoy a couple of yards away on a hummock with some raspberry canes.

I started with a series of dying snowshoe hare calls when a lynx came out of the tree line 15 yards in front of me. It was looking at the raven decoy when the decoy started to spin. The lynx took off at a dead run across the snow and nailed the decoy. It started to bite at it as it kept spinning under it. I had to get off my stand and walk down the trail yelling at it before it would let it go. I walked back to the stand realizing that again I didn’t have a camera but did have my cell phone. The lynx wouldn’t leave the area and kept circling back. I am not surprised as our hare population has crashed and they must be pretty hungry. It is the black speck under the middle of the hydro tower in this pic, and the tracks coming out of the treeline on the right hand side.



As it was sitting in the middle of the hydro line, I saw some movement and two more (smaller) lynx came out on the line and joined the one that hit the decoy. They milled around a bit looking back where the caller was still playing the dying hare call, and two of them lay down in the sun in the middle of the hydro line. I watched them for close to 30 minutes until they left.

I took this picture with the cell phone showing where the lynx ran across the snow to where the sit and spin was located. It is amazing that they can travel over such deep soft snow without sinking – I tried to walk on my snowshoe trail to pick up the decoy and couldn’t as I sank past my knees in the snow.



The decoy was none the worse for the experience – you can see the lynx tracks in the background



Went home and picked up my wife and drove out to where I had dragged the moose parts into. We weren’t very far outside of town when we started seeing wolf tracks. I think they are moving out to roads to get away from the deep snow in the bush. There were now tracks of at least 4 wolves where the remains of the road kill are. When I got to the beaver flood, there wasn’t a wolf track to be seen. But my wife spotted something odd looking back at the flood when we drove by it. I went back and snowshoed in and I am glad I did. The wolves have basically created troughs in the snow coming out of the bushline to get to the moose quarters. I broke a trail into where we have our stand locations and pounded it down – its still waist deep when I pound the snow down.

So heading out there in the morning early to be there before first light , and hopefully they will be there. As I am posting this the wind is coming up and its snowing again......
 
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Another great post Chas. Great pics. Looks like you're close to a snowmobile trail in a couple of those pics - do you find the sleds disrupt wildlife when hunting?
 
Hey , Thanks for the update.
The trail cam pics are making it look a little more promising.
You wearing down outer wear or gortex?
Thats some deep snow if your falling in with snow shoes on, that or your fatter than me.
Thanks for the Updates again !
Rob
 
A couple of minutes after the lynx left, three sleds went by. The animals coexist and use the trails for travel. I go out early in the am before the sledders start. I am usually not there so late but i was having too much fun watching the lynx.

I am wearing an old set of CF white nylon snow covers over gortex insulated bib pants and my gortex hunting coat.

No joy sunday, pack didnt show up after a night of wind and more snow......

 
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AAAARGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHH :bangHead::bangHead::bangHead:

Ok – Gunner410 was off this weekend so we headed out yesterday. It has been a brutal week with temperatures -30 and colder and topped off with a full scale blizzard on Friday, which closed the highway 17south for 24 hours due to white out conditions.

We drove north to where I had placed some moose carcass remains on a beaver flood. The wolves had been there since the snow stopped the previous evening and when we got there after sunrise. I saw some tracks there mid week and I figure they must have been there all week as almost everything was consumed except for the head.



Nothing responded to our calls and there was no activity (other than a lynx) at our other bait site. We went back that night to the beaver flood and chopped another hole in the ice and froze a moose head into it for further bait. We made plans to hunt there at start of legal shooting time this morning.



Get up this morning, pick up Gunner410. He says – do you know how cold it is? I hadn’t checked the thermometer – it was – 36 C! Drove over to his wifes convenience store for a coffee, came out, hopped into my Escape, and tried to back out. Vehicle isn’t going back properly, wont drive forward properly. Get out, rear drivers wheel is seized and wont turn. Take his wifes vehicle to my house, grab my truck and decide we need a Timmies for the road. As we pull in Gunner410 points out there are 4 paws sticking up out of the back of a half ton. I walk over and look, two nice wolves tagged in the truck. Walk into Timmies, start talking with 3 American wolf hunters who were up at an outfitters. Nice guys and we chat for 10 minutes.

Finally, an hour after we were supposed to have been on the road, we head out to the beaver flood. As we drive by, we can see that there are tracks of 4 or 5 wolves coming out of the bushline and to the highway. We drive past the baitsite to turn around at a snowplow turnaround where we can see the tracks of the pack going up an unplowed bushroad.

We got out to drain coffee and saw a number of ravens circling over the crest of a hill on the bushroad. We walked up the hill and more ravens were coming up. As we got to the crest, I could see there was a moose carcass on the left side of the road and a big black wolf standing there on the right side of the road facing us head on. I am taller than Gunner410 and he was walking in front, and he hadn’t seen it yet. I whispered there was a wolf and he was unlimbering his rifle. I couldn’t shoot as he was directly in front of me, and I stepped off the packed trail and into the deep snow. The wolf was starting to move and I got the crosshairs on him, but still couldn’t shoot as he was screened by a bunch of alders and I figured that any shot from the 22-250 would just disintegrate in the brush. The wolf slowly trotted into the bush and neither of us could get a shot at it.

Sound familiar?? f:P:

So we sat there to see of it would come back out, but no joy. I tried moving off to a small ridge and ended up in waist deep snow, almost lost a boot in the process. Needless to say, was pretty frustrated when we left. We set up at the beaver flood, but nothing came out, so we headed home so I could get my escape towed to the dealer (and seriously considered taking up drinking the afternoon away…)
 
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Too bad about the luck but thanks for sharing your stories with us, they are great.... Hope you connect soon, looking forward to reading more.
 
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