ABQJournal Online » Coyote Hunters Want Fun By Thomas Cole / Of the Journal on Sat, Nov 17, 2012
If all goes as planned by organizer Mark Chavez, more than 100 hunters will spread out across New Mexico this weekend to kill coyotes.
Chavez, owner of Gunhawk Firearms in Los Lunas, estimates about 150 coyotes will be killed.
That’s a fraction of a fraction of 1 percent of all the coyotes in New Mexico. Still, I guess you could argue that coyote-killing contests are, to some degree, about controlling a predator population, albeit not a very effective way to do that.
But coyote-killing contests are about something else, too: having “some fun.†…
Why this coyote-killing contest has attracted so much attention isn’t clear. It certainly isn’t the first coyote-killing contest and certainly won’t be the last.
The World Coyote Calling Championship was held in Belen at the Valencia County Fairgrounds in 2010 and 2011. I couldn’t find results for 2011, but hunters killed 273 coyotes in 2010. A father-son team won the event, with nine coyotes killed.
New Mexico Sportsmen for Fish & Wildlife will hold its sixth annual coyote-killing contest next weekend, Nov. 24 and 25., at Aztec Machine & Repair in Bloomfield.
There will be cash prizes for most coyotes killed, as well as money for smallest and biggest coyotes. A light dinner will be provided to participants Nov. 25 after the killing is done. …
Another coyote-killing contest is scheduled for Jan. 10-12 in Gallup. It’s hosted by Red and Jackie Cunningham, according to the website of the National Predator Hunters Association.
Coyote-killing contests need to be recognized for what they are: a way to have “some fun.â€