Predators Den
 

**** Warning**** This site contains bold and graphic stories & photos of poor dead woodland creatures. If you are a tree humping, bunny loving animal rights activist who puts animal rights equal or above human rights you should leave now!....................................

Welcome friends to the Predator Den! I created this site to share my adventures and lessons learned in the art of predator hunting. I am very young to this sport and do not claim to be an expert in this field, only a novice that has had a bit of luck! I am an outdoors nut, I love fly fishing and hunting, but my true love is Predator hunting. Once you have caught the bug there is no turning back! This sport can become very addicting and before you know it you have been sucked in and trying to find out and explore every field of this sport. For me if I'm not out hunting or scouting for new hunting grounds, I'm tanning pelts form the past season, or honing my shooting skills at the range, tinkering with my guns and so on! I currently live on Kodiak Island in Alaska with my wife and son who we were blessed with on September 11,1999. Kodiak is a sportsman's dream Island, we have some of the best fishing and hunting in the world. All in one day you can go hunting for deer, bear and fox and than hit the water in the afternoon for some salmon fishing and than hit the woods again in the evening! In the late summer of 2000 I will be moving to Topeka Kansas and look forward to the chance of doing some coyote and Bobcat hunting! 

the basics of the hunt.                                                                                    scouting-Go out and do some scouting, find places you wish to hunt. See if the area holds game, find there trails and watering holes. Do they travel these trails at night or by day? Is this area heavily hunted by others? Does this area hold signs of your prey scent rubs and diggings, droppings(poop), remains of killed game from your prey) Is this area safe and legal to hunt? Can you make several stands in this area and so on. CAMO- You need this! Get a full set of camo clothing from head to feet. Try and match the pattern of the places you wish to hunt. Also paint that rifle of yours, you didn't buy the gun to look pretty did you? A rifle is bright and shinny and real pretty to look at but this will scare your prey away. Once your prey see's that glare from your rifle its after-burners will light up and than there's no chance at calling that bad boy back into shooting range. There are many ways to get your rifle camoed, you can spend a couple hundred dollars and have it dipped( link for this will be posted on the last page), you can get some camo tape, gun socks, or you can get a few cans of spray paint and go to work on it! I like to just paint it, it is simple and cheap! Calls And Calling- There are hundreds of calls out there, some are really good and some are real pieces of shit! I will discuss what I use later on. If you are new to calling and need to hear what type of sounds you should be producing I would recommend getting a closed reed Sceery call and one of his video's. The two videos I have are "The Science of Predator Calling" and "The Guide To Using PREDATOR CALLS" By Dr. Ed Sceery, either one will give you the basics of calling. I like Sceerys' calls and really only use his calls, I do own a few that are not made by him but the ones that I grab just before a hunt are Sceerys'! I do not know much about the electric calling products out there, I happen to enjoy hand calls and fell it a bit more of a challenge! In the future I will probably cough the cash up for one but that's a long way down the road! After a long day of hunting and carrying a few predators home I can only imagine the pain of the extra weight of a electric call too! But I can also see the advantages to them, helping in keeping your movement done to nothing and also it can be a bit hard to keep those cross hairs lined up on the love box after 15-20 minutes of calling. Sitting STILL And Being QUIET-Are just that, sitting still and being quiet! That does not mean scratching your ass or picking your nose! A predators eyes are 100% better than yours and it is one way it stays alive! The slightest movement that does not look natural to it will set its warning lights off and he will high tail it out of there. This all starts as soon as you get out of you truck/car, don't slam the door shut or carry on with Billy Bob you hunting partner. Remove all non hunting and calling items from you and leave them in the car. The sound of keys jingling in you pocket as you walk to your stand is like blowing a fog horn to let the critters know your coming! If you are like me and have a hard time sitting still for too long in one spot try this exercise- Find a real crappy 30 min Tv show( should not be that hard since most of today's tv is crap) or listen to the president lie for thirty minutes with out making a sound or a movement! And repeat this until you can successfully sit still. I chose to listen to the president make more promises he cant keep or tell more lies, you see I cant stand the man and my blood boils and I start yelling at the TV, this also keeps me up to date on him and his goon squad! Respect for the dead- If you are going to take the time to go and hunt predators than you need to take the time to retrieve there pelts! You may not want the pelts and that is fine, contact your local taxidermist and see if you can cut a deal with him, check out your local trapping assc. there are plenty of trappers that will take the hides off your hands and some may even give you a real good price for them. Either way you will get more cash for the pelts if the have been fleshed and stretched! I tan my own hides and hang up on the wall. To me it is a disgrace and gives the hunting community a bad name when hunters shoot there prey and leave it there for all the bunny thumpers to see. If you shoot an animal with mange, burn it!, or turn it in to the local game biologist! Don't let it spread.

   
 
This is the one that got me hooked for life.  With not much know how about predator hunting/calling I set into the wood one day with the dog, my .22lr and a diaphragm call. I was really just going out to plink some rabbits with the dog and try this call out I just bought! The dog and I found no rabbits so we started to head back home. On the way back home I stopped to try this call out. The dog and I are out in the open, no camo, standing in the middle of an old dirt road. The dog is moving around and here I am trying to make a sound of a dieing rabbit. Well about 5 min. pass and snow starts to fall, dog and I head for home. We start to go round a bend in the road, A FOX! He is about 75 yards in front and heading away from us slowly. I told the dog to sit, took aim with my iron sights. Buck fever takes over, I shoot the fox in the hind quarter. After learning I have a wonderful tracking dog, I catch up with the fox. I dispatch the fox and praise my wonderful dog! If it had not been for my dog that fox would have had a slow death or a very painful winter.
 Cross Fox.. Called this one for a friend of mine. We had hit a couple stands and had no luck. On this stand we were on a small trail that had a stream running under it. We both took to opposite sides, and I started to call with the single reed diapgram . About 15 minutes into calling we called this guy in. My buddy took it with his shotgun. After getting to the fox we noticed he had a BAD case of mange. From his shoulders down to his tail was infected. This was my buddy's first fox, and would have made a real nice Trophy of a first fox. But we also helped this fox and the others. This fox probably would have starved to death over the winter, and would have spread on his disease to other fox. This is the day it really hit me that my true e love was predator hunting. To successfully call in you prey is a reward of its own!
My first Fox...

.22mag pistol...I took this guy while out hunting deer. We had not seen any deer all morning long and the folks I was with wanted to go look over the hill. I decided to stay and see if I could call a fox in. I called this guy into around 25 yards and dropped him with one shot from my Heritage Rough Rider .22 mag pistol. I got the pistol for my trap line, but also have it when I call for Real close shots!

 

lesson learned, I learned a lot from this fox and I still am! If I had to do it over I would have seeked some cover and tried to call him in closer. I also would have used some sort of a rest to place a solid hit. The .22 is not really a great fox gun, the bullet does not expand enough and is a little light, so I set out to the range and became a crack shot with my Marlyn .22.  I used my dog to track down the fox, and if I had not had him with me that fox would have gotten away. I don't believe in the use of dogs to hunt predators or big game predators, but some do and that's ok but not for me! So choose you weapon wisely and learn how to use it, and if the shot does not look good don't take it.
Trap line.... These are two fox from my small trap line, This was my first try at trapping and it was allot of fun. I learned a lot about my prey and trapping. I had about 7-12 snares out by a lake that is a few miles from home. It was a lot of work, had to check those traps every day no matter what the weather was like, but it was worth every bit of effort! I think this would be a great Father and son/daughter  hobby! A wonderful way to chase those winter time blues away!
 
The silver fox was called December 30,1999. Fresh snow had fallen, so it was easy finding some fresh tracks. I had already tried calling in two of my stands with no luck! It was a very cold morning with 25 below zero wind chill factor. I was thinking about calling it a day but decided to try one more stand. I slowly and quietly headed to stand number three. I did not want to scare anything off by pounding through the brush and snow. It was about 10:30 am when I got to my spot. The spot I chose was in a group of trees that offered a good six foot elevation to watch the surrounding area. I let the woods settle down a bit, looked around to check out all my shooting angles and all was clear. I began calling with a diaphragm call, starting with a out a few low squeals and slowly raised the volume of my calling. About 15 minutes had passed and not one thing had come check me out, so I mixed up the calling with a plastic tube call (rabbit in distress) and did this for about another 15 minutes. Just as I was putting the tube call into my pocket I spotted a black spot coming out of the brush about 120 yards. I froze, waiting to see if he saw me putting my call away. He slowly kept on coming in, and stopped about 75 to 100 yard out. He took a look around and could not see what was making all the racket so he decided to go back into the woods! I still had my diaphragm call in my mouth, so I gave that a few puffs to get him to come back! He turned around and came to the edge a small stream and sat down, he started sniff the wind a bit. Now by now my heart is pounding fast and hard, I'm thinking to myself " This is a silver fox, don't mess this up! I slowly raised my Marlin .22 lr, centering my Tasco 3x7 scope onto his ticker, giving a bit of lead due to the wind. I took a few deep breaths and on the last one I let part of it out and squeeeezed the trigger. I watch the fox do a few summer salts and than Drop! "YES", I have my Silver fox. I run over to him and give a nudge with my boot to make sure he is dead, I then checked his pelt and it is all silver! A dream come true!, but I don't think I could have made that shot if I had not spent hours practicing with that gun and at different ranges to see were it shoots! When I got home the fox tipped the scale at 15 1/2 pounds!

Fur handling -As I said before if you are going to take the time and effort in killing it, you best take the  damn time to harvest the pelt! If you don't you are nothing but a lazy bastard slob ass trash hunter( was that clear enough?) who really is only giving the Anti's more ammo to take this sport away from us. That's cool if you don't want the the hides, check around there's people out there who do and some who will pay for them. If you do want the hides and wish to tan them or sell them at a fur auction, than you need to learn the basics of fur-handling. I consider this to be just a branch of the sport of predator hunting and enjoy the tanning and other crafts that come along with it. I won't go into great detail about tanning because it can be tricky and there are a lot of ways to go about it. Plus let's say you go about it as I describe and you have hair slippage or it comes out all wrong, would you blame yourself? No you would start calling me every name in the book and send me nasty E-mails! There are a lot of good books and video's to get you started, I will post some links on the last page. If you do wish to get into home tanning, I can not stress enough on getting the proper tools. Fleshing beams and wood stretchers can be easily made yourself and is a lot cheaper too. But do get a commercial made fleshing knife, it makes a world if difference. It's not a great photo but these are two fox that I have tanned at home and now have up on the living room wall. Doing your own tanning has many rewards from being able to sell your hides to a great way of remembering a special hunt.

Calls....From left to right. Screery AP-7 open reed, AP-6 variable predator call, Primos coy dog howler megaphone, Sceery AP-5 snowshoe hare, AP-2 cottontail call, and Primos jackrabbit call #306. The three diahgram calls in the center from left to right are Primos #170 single reed and triple reed, and Quaker Boy single reed Rabbit squealer .  If I had to pick just one call it would be a ether the Ap-7 or the Ap-6 Sceery calls. They both are outstanding and can produce multiple sounds. I just got the Coy Dog call, it was marked down to $7.00, hoping to use it when I move to Coyote country. And the nice white thing with fangs is the skull of my first fox!!
Calling... Mouth blown calls do take a little practice to get the proper sounds.  The easiest to learn are closed reed calls, you simple hold the call and blow. You will want the end of the call to be partly covered by your hand, than to control the sound you simply open and close your hand. You want to sound like an animal that is getting a tattoo!! Open reed calls are like having seven calls in one. Open reed calls take a little more practice, but are well worth the extra effort. They also are controlled by hand movement but more importantly  by mouth placement on the reed.  Changing the placement of you mouth on the reed will produce dozens of different pitched sounds! Most calls do not cost all that much, so go out by a few different brands and find out what works for you. I love and will stick with the Sceery calls, go buy one you won't be disappointed!!

NEF Handi Rifle.......This is my New England Firearm(NEF) sb2 Handi Rifle. It is chambered in the .22 Hornet and sports a Simmons ATV 4.5x14x40WA/AO scope. To much scope? Ok, if you think so! But your not shooting it now are you! I know a lot of people pass up on the handi rifle because of the price! Yup the price, it is cheaply priced compared to other guns out there. People make the mistake thinking if the price is low it must be a poor shooting firearm. Heck even I did. We all get caught up in the money game, he who pays the most for his gun has the best gun!! In some cases that is true, but I'm not in the market for 1000+ yard rifle to shoot at an egg(at least not yet!). This gun is for harvesting small poor woodland creatures!  You can send away for other barrels to be fitted to the gun for about $75, ranging from the .22 hornet to the 45/70! In all not a bad deal. A couple thing to make it shoot better are to float the barrel and to get a trigger job done. The trigger is well over 6 pounds of pull, a good gunsmith should be able to bring it down to around 3-4 pounds of pull. For safety reasons I would not try the trigger job or the floating of the barrel, I would leave it to a qualified gunsmith. But if you want to understand how it is done for just educational purposes there will be a link about it on the last page!!! So how does it shoot? Well look below!

These are 3 shot groupings, (YES, three shots) at 100 yards. the square is 1" from edge to edge
Again, 3 shot groups at 100 yards using my shooting stix.   The one on the left is size of a nickel and the right a dime!!!!!

Improving your shooting... There is nothing like missing a shot at your prey or wounding it, to ruin your day. We all have missed at game, it happens, but why did we miss, excitement, flinching, not using a rest, etc? If you want to bring fur home you have to start at the range, you can't bring fur home if you can't hit it! Get out and practice! Learn how to judge your targets(prey) distance. One yard is the average mans stride. Throw a couple targets out down range, shoot at them and also estimate there range, than walk out to them counting your steps to see how off you were. Don't just go out practicing on perfect days, go out on windy days to learn how to judge the wind with your shots. When we hunt the weather is not always that great, so why not learn how to shoot in not such perfect weather conditions? Use a rest for your gun, it will improve your shooting ten-fold! Be it commercially made shooting sticks or home made ones you can't go wrong. I made my own out of two wooden dowels 36'' long, I drilled a hole about 2 1/2''-3'' from the top and put a wing nut and bolt through it. You can cut the bottoms of the dowels to a point or a nail with the head cut off to stick into the ground/snow. You might also want to camo them too! I got this idea from Varmint Al's "Fur Bi-Pods".  To control the Excitement factor while aiming at your prey try to take a couple deep breaths and relax while you are aligning the cross hairs on the third or fourth deep breath only let part of it out, focus on your game and squeeeeeze the trigger! So get out there and practice, practice, practice, make it a whole family outing. What better time to teach your child guns safety and respect!

your rights..As a gun owner and sportsman your rights are being snatched up by the goon squad we call the government. This is one subject that gets my blood boiling and it becomes hard for me to put down in words with out sounding like a rambling loony. There are some very fine folks fighting very hard to keep our rights as gun owners and they need your help. I believe if you are not part of the solution than you are part of the problem! So get off the couch and stand up to the goon squad and there leader MR. licky dicky Clinton and be heard! Join one of the many organizations out there fighting for your rights. Educate your friends and family on what is going on and what needs to be done. As an American you have the right to stand up and to be heard SO DO IT! Visit some of the sights below, they are a bit better at discussing politics than I am and some have devoted there life for this fight.
A great place to start and a lot of excellent links. But you just might get sucked in and you might not come out for days!
-- A very good site!
-- A MUST READ! These folks have devoted there life for your rights!
National Rifle Assc. BECOME A MEMBER!
Chat boards and rooms
Great bunch of folks, and real great place to learn about all aspects of the sport
A bunch of good 'ol boys sharing the secrets of the hunt
another great place to hang out
Lots of different rooms , but good place to go
Lots of rooms.
Some great place to check out
A great place to start, probably the best webpage on the net.
Also a great place to get some know how!
A TOP notch site!
Trapping and fur handling supp.
More trapping and fur handling supp.
Trapping and fur handling stuff!
All about The NEF handi rifle and modifications.
Targets! Print 'em out and go shoot 'em!
More targets.

Well I hope you enjoyed your stay at the PREDATORS DEN, and if you didn't, well there was a warning on the first page! If you would like to drop me a line just give a click MAIL. I'm sorry that I could not have shared more with you all but space was limited! Come back as I probably be adding and changing things as time goes by! So get out there and hunt, but be safe and share it with a kid! Well I'll see you out in the fields or one of the chat rooms above! Later!

   
 
 
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