I was seated in a Small quiet café with a thick heavy woolen socks Scandinavian flavor. This is a very small town. It’s so close to the Canadian border they have an exchange rate for your coffee cup, and it’s a good one.

January in northern Montana can be brisk. The few inhabitants of this small community really enjoy out of towners if you’re well behaved. They like you staying there anyway because you actually affect there economy no matter how little you spend, but nice manners gets a bigger helping at the diner.

So after three days of average coyote hunting we have rented a set of hotel rooms, bought all kinds of truck fuel and eaten at the two competing restaurants at least 10 times. One serves breakfast and lunch the other serves lunch and dinner so they compete over the lunch crowd but we have offended no one yet.

Shuffling towards us has to be the elder statesman of this town. He comes to the table slowly and introduced himself by name and politely asks to join us for breakfast. My hunting partner pulls out the chair closest to him and he is now seated. The first thing he tells us is that he is the mayor. We offer congratulations and he says “well it’s really not that big a deal, it’s just my turn again”.

Anyone we ask for the entire hunting trip has allowed us to hunt on there land. The biggest concern expressed to us was not to hunt to close to the buildings on the property. Just about every family finishes the conversation with “you guys can stop for dinner to if you like”. Its not our charming personalities its simply that this town is full of friendly warm humans that spend all year being nice to each and getting along, so if a few hunters show up they just act like it was last Tuesday or next Saturday afternoon. Several ranchers even said they would call there relatives to let them know we may hunt there property as well. They set up hunting opportunities for us in advance. “We aint in Kansas anymore toto” rings in my weird sense of humor.

The evening waitresses serving dinner have worked on the farm or ranch all day and to come to town and make some tip money one or two nights per week is a chance to get out of the house. They tell us all about there kids or hubby and say that sometime there going to take a trip to see Lake Superior where we have come from.

One night during our hunting vacation we hit the local watering hole. After maybe an hour we are completely surrounded by the locals. They think to drive one way twelve hours to end up here for coyotes is pretty funny. They chide us about actually trying to hunt what they consider rogue dogs. They spend all summer with ranch rifles educating the yote’s. It’s no big deal to them. But from the reddish brush wolf of northeastern Minnesota to the silver tipped lanky coyotes of Montana this is quite a kick for us.

The first morning set-up we are just below a rolling hill crest. The sunrise is mixed morning glow with a frosty fog swirling across miles of open country. I face east and my buddy is lying prone facing west. I take a deep breath and start a dying, possibly freezing, rabbit call. I can see my breath and after I finish a full two minutes of screaming ear piercing sound, my call froze up and sounds like I should give it a rest anyhow.

Two coyotes sweep into focus. They look bigger than timber wolves and winter prime. Both have come into my sight path and I try to whisper for my buddy to turn and we may end up with a double. Since I can barley make out his outline only feet from me I think he should be able to move about. He sez no way. The winter white camo were wearing is from Norway and we meld completely into the snow and I like to think the town as well.

The coyotes are ranging and slinking up the hills face. Then they both disappear from view with a low area they are ascending. At twenty feet they look massive and lock up. Both heads twist and ears radiate, but they do not see us. The dog farthest at twenty feet starts to move and the second drops in to follow. I scope it shoulder high and let go on the trigger.

That day we called in six coyotes and then the Montana you read about in old westerns rears up and locks us in our hotel for over a day and a half. The snow is a “white out” you cannot imagine unless you’re in it. The wind is close to jet wash and you have to push into to it to walk. Snow is flying sidelong and it feels like sand. It roars. The sound is nothing like I have ever heard around home.

During one of our third or four boredom lunch runs more than one person said there’s a good chance that snow blew in from northern British Columbia Canada and it will be in Iowa in a few minutes. It’s making believers out of us. It may be freezing cold outside but these have to be some of the warmest folks on planet earth.

The trout whisperer

Karl "Trout Whisperer" Seckinger is a respected JustNorth author and outdoor adventurer. His guide service, DuNord Guide Service, and the trout waters that he fishes in the Superior National Forest, are some of the most tightly guarded secrets among Trout enthusiasts in Minnesota and Wisconsin.

Contact Karl at 218 - 525 - 0442 or write to him at:

DuNord Guide Service - 6999 Culbertson Road, Two Harbors, Minnesota 55616