placing traps, and success in doing so will come only with a full knowledge of the habits of the two predators and after repeated experiments with trap sets. Of the two animals, possibly the wolf is the more difficult to trap. It is cunning, and as it matures from the yearling stage to the adult its cleverness at times becomes uncanny. Individual coyotes also possess this trait, particularly old animals that have been persistently hunted and trapped with crude methods.

The steel trap, in sizes 3 and 4 for coyotes and sizes 4K and 14 for wolves (114 in Alaska), is recommended for capturing these large predators. Steel traps have been used in this country by many generations of trappers, and although deemed by many persons to be inhumane, no better or more practical device has yet been invented to take their place.

On the open range coyotes and wolves have what are commonly referred to as “scent posts,” or places where they come to urinate. The animals usually establish these posts along their runways on stubble of range grasses, on bushes, or possibly on some old bleached-out carcasses. Where ground conditions are right for good tracking, these scent posts may be detected from the toenail scratches on the ground made by the animals after they have urinated. This habit of having scent posts and of scratching is similar to that noted in dogs. As wolves and coyotes pass over their travel ways, they generally stop at these posts, invariably voiding fresh urine and occasionally excreta also.

Finding these scent posts is of prime importance, for it is at such points that traps should be set. If such posts 'can not be found, then one can be readily established, if the travel way of the coyote or wolf has been definitely ascertained, by dropping scent of the kind to be described later on a few clusters of weeds, spears of grass, or stubble of low brush. The trap should then be set at this point. Any number of such scent stations can thus be placed along a determined wolf or coyote travel way.

Time consumed in finding a wolf or coyote scent post is well spent, for the success of a trap set depends upon its location. Coyotes and wolves can not be caught unless traps are set and concealed where the animals will step into them. If traps are placed where the animals are not accustomed to stop on their travel ways, the chances are that they will pass them by on the run. Even if a wolf or a coyote should detect the scent, the fact that it is in an unnatural place may arouse the suspicion of the animal and cause it to become shy and make a detour. Often the fresh tracks of shod horses along wolf and coyote runways are sufficient to cause the predators to leave the trail for some distance. A lone wolf is much more cautious than a pack of wolves running together.

Travel ways of coyotes and wolves are confined to open and more or less broken country. In foraging for food over these runways the animals may use trails of cattle or sheep, canyons, old wood roads, dry washes, low saddles on watershed divides, or even highways in thinly settled areas. Any one of these places, or any combination of them, may be a wolf or coyote runway. Wolves have been known to cover a circuitous route of more than a hundred miles in an established runway. It is in such country that their scent posts should be looked for.

B19741; B24414; B19739

Figure 1.—First step in setting traps for wolves and coyotes. The stubble and woods near the traps are the scent post: A, Trap and stake in position, and