25 replies to this topic

[CGC Mitch]

Whats the biggest coyote anyone knows of like how much they weighed ? I always figured the were like everything else the farther north the bigger they are .

[bar-d]

CGC Mitch said:

Whats the biggest coyote anyone knows of like how much they weighed ? I always figured the were like everything else the farther north the bigger they are .

For purebred coyotes, probably true. I don't know about your area but here in Texas we have what is called a coydog. For some reason a lot of city folk tend to haul their unwanted pets out in the country close to my ranch and turn them out. Some of the bigger breeds will survive while most of the smaller breeds become prey if they are not found and rescued first. The bigger dogs will eventually go feral, especially if they were mistreated by humans. They can and do interbreed with coyotes and that is where you get a coydog. In about 1981, I shot the bigger of three coyotes going across a tank dam at about 150 yards, thinking mother and 2 pups. When I recovered the coyote, it was a HUGE male weighing nearly 65 lbs. I was shocked. The "pups" were normal size coyotes. I talked to the government trapper we had at the time and he told me it was the 2nd biggest he had heard of. A feller about 20 miles northwest of me had killed one a few months before that weighed, according to the trapper, 70 lbs. He told me that coydogs have the cunning and instincts of a coyote and the natural lack of fear of humans of a domestic dog.
NOT a good combination.

[wilded]

Read a book called "Americas's New "Wolf" by Gene Letourneau. It goes into the hybridization of coyotes, grey wolves, the remaining red wolf population and feral dogs. It has created a new race of super coyotes that are larger, smarter and have many colors. Notice the increase in black or black and white coyotes around the country. In the South and East many coyotes will have these other caninies dna in their makeup. Here are a few pictures for you to study. JMHO ET

[wilded]

A few more:

[bar-d]

wilded is right. If you look, you can see IMO influences of a German Shepard in the coat color, size and shape of the head, etc. Hence: bigger dog breeds.

[hassell]

Mitch
Yes they are larger and have a higher quality fur the farther north you go. when i lived and trapped,hunted up by the Yukon the animals were very nice. i sold my furs in Vancouver,B.C.,and was there and talked and saw the furs the auction house had. they really craved the ones from the arctic for this reason.
hassell

[t-man]

coydogs have to be the ugliest things i have ever seen.

[Duane@SSU]

Biggest yote I have ever seen with my own eyes, was in Bucksport ME,1989, hanging on a certified state scale.The yote weighed 65#. I have never killed on that big, nor ever seen one that big since, that I could verify.
Just a note for comparison, I run a coyote hunt every year in Oregon.I keep very detailed records year to year. Over four years, (1, 48 hour hunt each year)
There have been 171 coyotes turned in total. We weigh every yote turned in for the contest.The biggest yote ever turned in was 40#.
I personally kill 125 to 150 + yotes a year, my personal biggest was a calf killer, shot right off the back end of a cow. That yote weighed 48#.
None of these figures mean any thing really, just some facts I've compiled over the years.

[CGC Mitch]

Thank that is neat and 150 a yr is awesome, as far as the coydogs ive heard that that is what has caused the color phases we have i saw one that was killed that was chocolate just as dark as a lab and then I missed one that looked like a husky. It is sad to say but I watched it forever to make sure it was a coyote becasue it was all black silver face silver legs it . It came out in a field and was mousing and I was still unsure but I eventually convinced my self to take it and I missed it was hard to take sixty yards standing still I was muzzleloading .

[CoyoteCraze]

I found it somewhere that the largest recorded coyote weighed in at just over 75 lbs. It didn't have a year or location with it. We killed a 48 lber last season here in western NE and that was the biggest one I'd ever got my hands on. Around here, 40 is a huge dog!!

[TBROutdoors]

Largest coyote we have ever harvested went 46.5 pounds - he only had 3 legs.
I agree with Geoff on this one...40+ is a large animal for us here in the Midwest.

Richie
TBR Outdoors

[Cur Dog]

bar-d and wilded those are some mighty good pics. I have seen Coydogs in my area off and on for years. Most of the time they are ugly as home soap
Cur Dog

[bar-d]

Cur Dog said:

bar-d and wilded those are some mighty good pics. I have seen Coydogs in my area off and on for years. Most of the time they are ugly as home soap
Cur Dog

Sorry cur dog, wilded supplied all the pics. I agree, nice pictures.

[Cur Dog]

Not a problem bar-d. I was not trying to offend anyone.

[wilded]

Guys I can not take credit for the pictures. I have collected them from trapping websites and just posted them for you to see. I have been studying coydogs since I owned my first one in 1973. I have watched the coyote change into a different animal than I knew as a kid in many areas. They have gotten bigger through hybridization and thus started taking down bigger game. The losses of deer, antelope and livestock have increased to millions of dollars a year Since I minored in wildlife biology I continued to study coydogs and coyote red wolf hybrids and watch them become a new breed of coyote in the last 30 years. Every time there is a hybrid it breeds back into the population base but it adds hybrid vigor and size. So through the years coyotes have gotten bigger. Let a male wolf or a male coyote run across a female feral dog in heat and watch what happens. Nine times out of ten they will breed her. Coyotes and wolves will kill feral dogs but it is packs and females that do that and the dogs they kill or not usually in heat. A wolf/dog hybrid will breed with coyotes or wolves. <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" /><st1:State w:st="on">Texas</st1:State> had a small population of red wolves and a smaller population of Mexican wolves that basically were bred into oblivion and absorbed by the coyote population as coyotes numbers increased throughout the State of <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:State w:st="on">Texas</st1:State></st1:place>. This also changed the makeup of our native coyote. The same has happened in some of the areas in the northeastern and the eastern <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:country-region w:st="on">United States</st1:country-region></st1:place>. So in areas where you do not have a wolf population and areas close enough to big cities to have feral dogs you will have a different wild canine that is bigger, occurs in many more colors and is very human savvy, thus harder to call. JMHO

[MGTEXAS]

I think that I recall hearing that there are several subspecies of coyotes. when I hunted for hides to sell in AZ many years ago, the best dogs were always the high mountain dogs. average males weighed about 35-40 pounds although I have killed several that went almost 50. The ones that we killed at 7000 feet elevation or higher tended to be bigger and much thicker built and always had much better hair, grey or silver with super guard hairs. the lower elveation ones were always smaller, tended to have black or reddish hair mixed in and never brought nearly as much. I killed a few way high up that brought $100 but they averaged about $65. the low country darker yotes usually brought $35 to $50, less inches and less better color. here in TX I have seen a lot of 30lb yotes with a lot of black hairs, I suppose from interbreeding. I will do a little reasearch on this. Seems I read or hear there were 5 subspecies. interesting thread. MG

[wilded]

Here are links to a couple of good articles on hybrids.

Wolf in Coyote's Clothing - ScienceNOW

Hybridization: the Double-edged Threat

[tkortright]

i live in upstate New York and the biggest coyote i heard of shot here was 70 LBS!!!

[swamper]

I've only shot 2 over the years no biggie 40 lb or so but want to get into it this spring or fall

[greenie]

Wow I guess Im just killing the small stuff nothing bigger than about 38lbs so far but there all good.