Registered: Nov 2014
Location: NC
Posts: 92

I was just wondering when the coons start to bring there young down from the den will it be okay to hunt? Or will the dogs separate them from there mom or will the dogs catch them on the ground? Or will it just be fine and not matter? Don't really wanna be hurting the coon population on my spots by killing all the young.

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Registered: Oct 2013
Location: Maryland
Posts: 2633

I am not gonna say you cant hurt the population, but my experience has been that very few kittens get caught on the ground. I always attributed this to the idea {maybe a fact, but I don't know} that the mother has way more scent and so the dogs will run her. Also, the kittens usually just pop right back up a tree at the least noise.
The mother usually starts bringing them down out of the den around the 1st of June in my neck of the woods and the kittens are pretty active and seem to get around good. They can and will climb a much smaller tree to get away so they usually don't have to go very far to safety.
Maybe I am wrong, but I base this on the fact that when I am hunting for predator control during the summer my dogs just never did seem to catch any kittens. These days I don't hunt my home grounds or farms I own during the month of June and July.
I do not kill coons from February to July unless it is for predator control {a landowner is trying to get rid of nuisance animals.} I definitely think it is way worse for the population to kill a pregnant female or one that has very young kittens in the den. You wipe out an entire family when you do this.
It's a cold hard fact that a dead coon cannot be run again...they are worth way more alive to any serious coonhunter.

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