The calling boxes have really taken off in sales. And there are some really good ones, but I prefer the mouth calls for calling bobcats and coyotes. There are reasons for this. I used 8 track tapes we had produced ourselves and played them on the player in my truck and had a speaker that I placed on the top of the truck in 1968. This was when the first cassette players came out but did not have enough volume for me. On a windy night you not use the cassette tapes. At this time in my teens, I used Weems calls made in Cleburne, Texas, just 15 miles away and got to meet Mr. Weems. One of the guys I played football with high school, father worked with him at Sante Fe Railways, and I met him and bought calls from him for my coyote calling. I also at the time was using Burnham Brothers calls in the early and mid 60’s. All of these were closed reed calls, and worked very well, and called in a lot of coyotes and foxes with them. I still use the same types of calls with great success. To me the best closed reed calls on the market are the Dan Thompson Calls, they are styled off of the old Weems calls, in fact we have talked about that many times. I also use the open reed howler calls, but use them to make jack rabbit sounds with great success. I use the hand calls because I can control the animal coming in better. If the tape keeps rolling when a predator shows up, if he has been called before, he will hold up at a distance and watch to see what is going on. If I see him coming in the distance, I will stop calling completely and only coax him if he stops coming in. He will tell me by his body language what he is going to do.

Calling cats as opposed to coyotes in daytime.
When I am calling bobcats I have a completely different Set than I do with coyotes. On my bobcat Sets I will look for a brushy draw or creek bed and try to get some elevation and good cover when I sit down. It is good to be thirty to fifty feet above the bottom of the creek bed. I only want to see at the most 100 yards. I want the wind in my face and to see clearly for forty to fifty yards over my right and left shoulders. I have a lot of bobcats try to sneak up on me, need to see them in advance. Bobcats just seem to appear out of the air, and be in shooting range without me seeing them coming in. It is much easier to hunt bobcats at night because the reflection of their eyes from the light.

Calling wolves in Canada and getting fox
When we are calling wolves in Canada, we get in a lot of fox and lynx coming into the call. Usually if they come in, you will not get a wolf in. They know when there is a wolf in the vicinity and refrain from coming in. There are some great color variations of fox in Ontario, silver, red and cross fox, that all make great mounts. The lynx cannot be taken while calling, the trappers are in control of all the lynx permits, and can only be taken by trap. It is real tough to get one in and just have to watch it until it decides to leave.