What is the best?

Was going to buy a new Fox Pro but there are so many makes and models to choose from now...thought I would get opinions.

Just a casual coyote hunter...BUT...when I go I want:

1) a riable unit and

2) a simple to use unit.

Lane, great post...I'm in the same boat. The Coyotes here are taking over, with nobody hunting them. Sometimes at night it sounds like there's a kennel nearby. I just bought a 243 to start to wage war, but am interested in electronic calls as well.

I just bought one at DSC. One can load different animals calls onto it including predator calls. I bought it to see if it would work with hogs. I am going to try coyotes at some point. I fear my place may be too thick.

I will let you all know.

I have a FOXPRO Spitfire. It is a low cost Foxpro. I have called in Hawks,Owls,Coyotes,Deer and Elk. It works amazingly well. Their is NO NEED to spend a lot of money on one!!!

The Top-of-the-line is Wildlife Technologies.

Foxpro, Johnny Stewart, ICOtech, Western Rivers, and more, will all work.

Fozpro is probably the most popular, because they are a good call and have a wide spread on price ($99-$800), and I have heard their service is great.

Of more importance than the call, is your stand selection. For example, if you set up with a brushy creek bottom 100yds downwind of you, you will not see any coyotes. You may have called 6 in, but they all used the cover to get downwindand then smelled you.

Watch the wind. If there is one thing I could chisel in granite as to calling coyotes, it's 'watch the wind'.

99.99% of the time will try to get downwind of the caller. In 28 years of predator hunting, I have had exactly one (1) come in with the wind at her tail.

As soon as they hear your call, they know precisely where your position is.

Good luck, and, watch the wind.

K-22hornet, Thanks for the advice. It will help me.

I have a fox-pro. No regrets at all. Several coyotes and bobcats as well. Still waiting on my first fox.

Have used ICOtech since they came out. Same few calls that were loaded on it. Excellent sound qualities with a far reaching remote. I tend to keep things simple, and it works. Too many options with some of the other calls. You don't need a hundred calls and every other gaget they came stuff onto them. Keep it simple.

I had an old Johnny Stewart cassette caller and that was stolen from my truck when my truck was stolen. I then bought one that took CDs but that thing would burn through batteries. I now have a Foxpro I think it's the Spitfire. It works fine but i'm thinking of buying a newer one for the newer features.

I've called in more coyotes with electronic calls, but killed a much higher percentage of coyotes called in with hand calls for some reason. It seems I'm always fiddling with the remote to turn it down when I spot one coming in instead of getting the gun ready. I've had many just blow in and jump the call and blow right out. When using hand calls you tend to just stop calling and get the gun on them...they see a little movement or just stop when the noise stops and gives you a perfect standing shot.

Primos Alpha Dog is by far the best caller I have had.I was tired of not being able to see the screen at low light just plain a pain to see
very good sound easy to see remote and excellent range of remote
two thumbs up from me

I don't know if it's the "best" but Foxpro has worked well for me. Decent volume and choice of calls.

The only annoying thing was you have to push once to select a call, then push again to send for it to happen. In the heat of the moment I would sometimes screw that up. Of course it could just be me. I'm sure my grand daughter could manage it all without fail.

I have a Foxpro. I would also highly recommend the FoxPro decoy. My coyote sightings are way up since I got it but on the downside they tend to come running in.

ICOtec GC500 Call here, I like it because it is programmable, you can add your own sounds to it, all on an SD card. Change the SD card and change stored sounds on the fly. It's remote has a very long range, like well over 100 yards. Also have the spinning Decoy that attaches to the call, you can turn it on and off with the remote.

I have a Foxpro Shockwave. Have had it about 5 years now.. And love it.. Get the rechargeable battery and decoy also..you wont be disappointed https://www.eurooptic.com/FOXP...c2018&utm_medium=rbh

I had a foxpro Fire storm, it worked well.
Just bought a Foxpro CS24C. Will try it this weekend.
Excellent points about the wind above. Watch down wind as that’s where there will be. And seen as they get your scent, they’re gone.
Also, some callers come with 100-200 sounds, that’s bs marketing. There may be that many sounds, but that’s just adds complexity. You can easily get by with less than 20 sounds for coyotes.

I have a FoxPro and they do have tons of features, but it’s not all happiness. Mine just came back from the mother ship, and while it’s still well within warranty, they charged me to fix the mysterious short that was driving me crazy. Although I was getting great exercise - walking back and forth to the call to shake it to try to make it work - it was blowing my cover from each spot and I finally mailed it back when I recently had to hike to shake it with a client and he said, “Didn’t it do that the last time we were hunting together too?”

Even more frustrating, the FoxPro folks asked that I return the expensive rechargeable batteries - that I bought from them - so they could test them. They agreed with me that they weren’t the issue…, but threw them away (for the call and remote) anyway “just in case they were a problem”. So… $100+ later I have their newest rechargeable batteries, it’s rewired so hopefully the short is gone, and I’m up and running again.

For what their calls cost you’d think they’d apologize for it needing repair so soon and fix it rather than holding it hostage and discarding accessories. They even made me pay shipping both directions. Obviously, I’m not real impressed with their Customer Disservice.

If it keeps costing this much to keep it running, I’m switching back to the old reliable mouth calls. They’re cheap, compact, and they ALWAYS function when needed.

quote:

For what their calls cost you’d think they’d apologize for it needing repair so soon and fix it rather than holding it hostage and discarding accessories. They even made me pay shipping both directions. Obviously, I’m not real impressed with their Customer Disservice.

That's not good to know, but thanks for the heads up with FoxPro.

I’ve owned a couple of foxpros, the firestorm and the fury. Lost the remote to the firestorm and the fury has a crackling sound when volume is tuned up all the way. Needs to go back to foxpro which I feel is entirely unnecessary considering how new the call is and how Little I have used it.

Needed a call to go with me up to Alaska on what may or may not be a one way trip. I was looking for something compact and cheaper. Well Cabela’s had a icotech gs500 on the shelf for $199 so thought it would be just fine.

Blown away by this call. Only thing it gives up to the foxpro is total volume but it’s plenty loud. Love the remote attach, size of the remote and overall compactness of it. Read so much and seen so many advertisements for foxpro I’d always assume they were the only ones out there. But what suits your fancy but the biggest advertiser isn’t always the best.

I ordered a Lucky Duck Riot Electronic caller and will send it to South Africa where a pal will load it with some African sounds. We will hunt Jackals, etc. for a week. I will let you know.

I like Foxpro. Whatever you get you should check out www.allpredatorcalls.com

God Bless, Louis

Ive used a cheap cassette tape to call coyotes, bobcats, foxes, ringtails..I have wood side boards on my pickup,to break up my silloute then a pillow on te cab of my pU, for the cassette, the pillow muffles the tinny sound of the cassette, use a red Q-Beam light, a rifle on one side of the pillow and a shotgun with no. 2s or 4s on the other side, give my hand call a few blasts and turn on the cassette..Ive killed as many as 25 coyotes I one night along with 4 or 5 bobcats, not counting ringtails skunks and badgers..When it got daylight Id run my trap line, take a long nap and do my cowboying the rest of the day..Back then I got $125 for coyotes. $600 for bobcats, didn't bother with the other stuff..called up two lions over the years, but never close enough for a shot, so depended on traps for them...

I should add that where coyotes have been called and hunted a good deal, they get smart and it takes better equipment Im told and don't doubt it, a coyote is the smartes varmint alive, some speak english and spanish!

With some of the FoxPro models, you can create a "FoxCast". This allows you to configure an entire calling sequence, including the volume level, multiple sounds, sound pitch, sound motion, decoy on/off, pauses etc.

This allows you to get in place, hit one button and have an entire sequence run. No fumbling with remotes etc.

A great way to do it is to add an initial pause of 2-3 minutes, this allows you to set the caller down, hit the button and give you time to get comfortable in your hiding place.

Heard about a guy setting up his electonic caller and expecting small varmints had varmint rifle. A bear came in and tore up his caller as he was afraid to shoot it with his small rifle.


Ray Atkinson--why do you shoot ringtails? The fur?
I hear they do no harm.

Carpetman,

My friend has killed two black bear in CO now with the use of his Foxpro caller. He has also called in Mt Lion but at the time we were hunting, apparently Mt lion was not in season.

I last spring I bought a Foxpro Shockwave on clearance sale. I've used it half a dozen times and so far it's head and shoulders above the older model foxpro I have. The volume is double or triple what that little one had.

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Palladin8: My friend has killed two black bear in CO now with the use of his Foxpro caller./QUOTE]

Your friend may want to read the CO bear hunting regs before he goes out again.....

I went Wildlife Technologies 20 some years ago. You couldn't beat them then and you can't beat them now.