CHOKING ON THE FOOD CHAIN

You wouldn't think that 2 hrs outside of one of the largest metropolitan areas in the world, you would have a life and death struggle playing out before your eyes, almost every day you walk in the woods. Somehow, it seems the case these days. Earlier in the week i got in the orchard stand for my evening hunt around 4pm. This stand provides the best view of the fields along the Neversink River. So even if I don't get a deer in close I always have action. This night I finally caught movement under the apple tree. Slowly reaching for my bow and clipping my release to the drawstring, the animal that revealed itself was not a deer but another big coyote. He stopped 15 yards in front of me, still hidden by a dead tree branch. I didn't dare stand. I'd have to try a sitting shot. I drew back, and as I did the side of my thumb caught my face mask completely blacking out my shooting eye. Franticly fiddling with it, I finally set the pin on his chest and fired. I had jerked the shot, hitting the dirt right in front of him. Fuck!
    As I've said many times- if something can go wrong it will. No sense in dwelling on it. Tomorrow's another hunt. The rest of the week was non-eventful, until yesterday. I decided to switch it up and hunt WSS. I have a stand on a wood line overlooking a big hay field. The wind was swirling out of the NW, so I wasn't too surprised when I jumped a half dozen deer heading up the wood road to the field Then, just as i crested the hill I saw a big doe standing there looking right at me. I stopped dead. She was too far for a shot. When she bolted to my left, followed by a fawn, I spied the head of a third animal staying put. I took a knee and nocked an arrow. I realized this wasn't a deer but again a coyote, coming right for me, at a good trot. Ducking behind a bush I pulled back the string......only to have a doe, that must've been watching the whole thing, bust out 5 yards behind me. As I turned my head to watch the doe escape, the coyote caught movement and blasted across the field, out of range. I couldn't believe the series of events. And I was still two hundred yards from my stand.
    In the spring I had called in multiple coyotes within easy shotgun range, while turkey hunting, only to let them walk. No more. To have two coyotes, in completely different areas, within bow range in one week is unheard of. Plus at a time of year when food is plentiful, having these critters chasing deer is very unusual. I can only surmise, like the mice that had taken over my kitchen, they are reaching critical mass. Pig and sheep farmer Buddy Budde and I went after them with the rabbit squealer, shotgun and rifle one morning this past week, only to be skunked. They seem to know when the firepower comes out. Don't ask me how. To all you hunters who read this blog, you better start shooting the dogs if you can. We are living in their world and it's only a matter of time before we're choking on the food chain.