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Monday, November 15, 2010

Fun and games in traffic

Bear with me on this one, it's got a bit of a lead-in before the story.

Anybody that's ever used a hand coyote call knows that it's something that you can't do real well right out the gate, especially coyote vocalization calls like barks, yips, howls and ki-yis.
And you gotta be able to switch the calls up without a lot of thought. For example, you're using a wounded jackrabbit squall and you bring in a pair of coyotes. You take the furthest one out first, but the near one has hit afterburner at the sound of the shot and is headed over the nearest ridgeline. Then you snatch your ki-yi and give it a try, hoping it'll either stop or circle back around to check on its' partner. The ki-yi sounds like your puppy when you stomped on its' little paw - "Ike-ike-ike-ike". My point is that you don't have time to figure out how to use it then, you better already know where to bite that reed, how much air to push through and when to taper off.
And because of that, I generally have a coyote call within reach for that spontaneous practice blow. I practice at home in my Camouflaged BassPro Easy Chair, I practice when I'm driving, damn near anywhere except work and the library.

So today was a pretty pleasant day, temps were in the upper 60s and sunny. I was driving around town with my window down, doing errands, enjoying the weather and just happened to get caught at the busiest intersection in town right at noon. I was playing with a couple of different calls, blowing them softly, while it took me 3 light cycles before I got up to the intersection. Right when the light changed, I honked hard on the ki-yi call and watched traffic in all 6 lanes immediately come to a stop while everybody tried to figure out if they were the one that ran over that puppy.
It's a good thing I was first in line because it was still stalled by the time I made the next light.
And no, I didn't do it on purpose.

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