Coyotes on our farm…

Monday we got a phone call from a neighbor that a sheep had died in our pasture.  We had been battling intestinal parasites ever since we received inches upon inches of rain leaving a nice damp pasture for them to thrive.  We assumed we had overlooked someone and they had succumed to the infestation with the help of a 100 degree day.

Dad went to check it out and called back to let us know a coyote had killed one of our ewe lambs.  He was nice enough to deal with her so she didn’t lay out there all day until we got home from work to take care of her.  Randy had been letting the sheep out around 6:00 before he leaves for work.  It’s still fairly dark, but we felt confident they wouldn’t wander out far in the dark and hadn’t had any predator problems to speak of.  This particular morning this little girl was not only at the far end of the pasture, but had crossed the electric fence to the other side away from the llama and most of the flock.  She was a target.  The coyote scooted under the fence and nabbed her.

That evening we had a guy come over to set snares to try to catch the coyote.  Since the lamb had already been hauled off it was a long shot she would come back for it, but we were still hopefull.  We found where she had dung under the fence and the hunt was on.  Above the hole  you could see a bend in the fence where she had come back through the fence in a hurry, went to high, and ran her nose into the woven wire fence leaving a big nose print.  The lamb wasn’t eaten completely so between that and the nose print in the fence we thought she had gotten startled and bolted, but may be back for the remains.

It’s day 2 and no coyote has been caught.  We have to rotate the sheep to the other side of the pasture this weekend which will put them on the side the lamb was killed.  We were really hoping we would catch the coyote before we had to move them, but so far nothing.

I’m so thankful we have someone who wants to set snares and try to get the coyote for us.  Snares are awful and shooting a dog is not something we would enjoy at all.  The only thing that would keep us going if we were left to the task is the thought of our little defenseless lamb and what it went through when that same coyote killed her and the fact that coyote would kill again if given the right opportunity.

Wish us luck as we hunt down the killer!