Is this coon sign? If so, how to hunt them?

[Okanagan]

My grandson took me on a scouting loop last week within a half mile of his house on the Olympic Peninsula of WA.  It is flat timbered plain with a big creek cutting a ravine through it.




The timber is Douglas Fir, hemlock, western red cedar, alder and a few maples.  There are coon tracks along the creek and one recently deceased coon went after their chickens till my son applied .22 behavioral modification therapy to him in the chicken house.

I have a Bandit e-caller with Minaska coon sounds.  If this is coon sign, below, how would you set up to call them?

We found several cedar trees with a virtual trail  up the trunk made from animals scratching the bark as they climb up the same route.  Shown below.  Is this coon?  There is whitish and grey hair stuck in the bark from the animal that climbed this tree, but we could not be sure what animal it came from.  There are also light claw marks similar to bear but much smaller.





We found droppings at the base of two cedar trees.  Is this coon?



The coon tracks below are along the creek, 50 to 150 yards from the cedar trees with scratch trails up them.



If these are coons, are they sleeping in these trees?  None are hollow as far as we can tell.  We never found a hollow tree.  

We tried to spot a coon in the branches but never did, though in other places I have seen coons sleeping during the day way out on the limbs of huge old cedar trees, much bigger trees than these.

In summary, is this coon sign and if so, how would you use this info to call them?

[Bills Custom Calls]

Kinda sorta looks like it to me and for as much traffic that is going up and down that tree I would say it is a den tree.

There is  something in that tree they like alot

I have never had any luck calling coon.When I hunted them it was at night and alwas had a dog a good coon light and a 22 rifle
Let the dog tree go to the dog and shoot the coon down and move on

You can also walk the woods at night and just shine the light around and if one looks at ya there eyes will light right up

[Jimmie in Ky]

They don't really need a hollow tree . They will curl up in a ball in a fork to sleep if weather is moderate.

I set up near heavy used areas near sunset and use bird distress . But a coon fight will work wonders if ya have a squaller. Your Miaska will do just fine. Old boars tend to be pissy when they come in. Jimmie

[FinsnFur]

Those tracks kind of have a porcupine flavor to them too.

[Okanagan]

Those tracks kind of have a porcupine flavor to them too.

Hmmm... You know, I thought that the toes on those tracks in the photo were not as long as on coon tracks in my memory when my Dad and I hunted them with hounds.    I have a porcupine track photo somewhere and will try to find it.  There are porkies common in that area as well as coons.  I didn't notice any quills under the cedar trees with the climbing marks, nor any quills nor long porcupine hairs in the bark, but didn't look a lot.  We took a few more pics of these tracks and may have another angle.  

[Okanagan]

Found some porcupine track pics, and more of the tracks along the creek and am pretty sure the creek side tracks above are coon.

First the porcupine, taken in dust last summer.





One of the characteristics of a porcupine tracks is the pebble grain texture of the pad, if the tracking medium is capable of showing it.  Also, the pad and toes don't correspond with raccoon very closely.  Almost no trace of toes are showing on these tracks in the dust, and they should if they are going to match up with those in the sandy mud of the creek.  On the other hand, toes (fingers?) are perhaps the most noticeable part of a coon track, to me anyway, and they tend to press in and show up more than the pad.

Below are three more pics of the alleged coon tracks along the creek from last week, one of them with some deer tracks in the pic.  I don't know about the tree and scat sign, but am leaning that these are coon tracks along the creek.

[HaMeR]

It doesn't take much for a coom to get into a tree. Basically if their head fits thru the hole their body will too. It appears the scratching ends about the 3rd branch up. Might be the picture angle too.  If it does maybe they are travelling those branches to a nearby den tree. The scat pic doesn't coincide with what I've seen here in Ohio. It tends to be more in a pile & granular kind of like deer only much smaller in size & in more of a pile rather than log form. That may also be indicative of their diet here which is a lot of berries.

I set up on a crow hunt one AM about 1/2hr before daylight. Finally after a couple of volleys with the 20ga a coon sat up on a branch about 15yds from me. Apparently his sleep was interrupted.  

About 1/3 way down this page is what I'm more accustomed to seeing. Again it could be diet specific to our area.
http://www.bear-tracker.com/coon.html

[Bills Custom Calls]

Hamer your right about the diet and the looks of the scat  Those in the pics seem more to berries and grapes
Find a coon that is living good on corn,feed ,or a more solid diet and it will look more like that in the pic that Okanagan has posted

[KySongDog]

Once you find the den site, coons can be called out in to the open with the sounds on that Minaska.   The Borland brothers made a dvd called "Crumblin Coons" which shows how they do it.

[FinsnFur]

Yeah the quill drag marks on the porcupine tracks are pretty clear arent they

[Okanagan]

About 1/3 way down this page is what I'm more accustomed to seeing. Again it could be diet specific to our area.
http://www.bear-tracker.com/coon.html

Thanks!  That's a great tracking site!

Down at the bottom of the coon stuff if you click on "Back to Animal Tracks Den" in the blue.turquoise box and then scroll down a bit and click on mammals, it takes you to samples of many animal tracks, with pics of scat and other info.  Under porcupines they have illustrations of porcupine tracks and foot casts that show long toes, much like a coon.   But in my experience the toes don't show up on the ground as much as they do with coons when they walk.  The porkie pads are wider than a coon hind foot, and don't match up with the tracks we're talking about taken in the creek bottom.

I learned some stuff from y'all and especially from Jim's musing that it might be a porkie.

[Jimmie in Ky]

From what I know you can think of them as a small bear where diet is concerned. Like bears they are omnivorous. Whatever bears eat in your area they will eat along with small water creatures. Berries and seeds make up a good deal of their diet. One of hte best baits I found for traps was marshmallows, they love 'em.

You can also find den sites in rock crevaces if htere are any nearby. They even take over ground hog holes here for den sites.

And hte hairs you found sound like coon to me. They tend to leave a few just about anywhere htey go. And if htey can get their head in it they will go through it. I have seen where they went through chicken wire. I used machine cloth for the back of some box traps once. Bad idea, they tore a hole in it. Stout little critters. Jimmie

[HaMeR]

You're Welcome. I've never seen porcupine tracks til now either so we're even. Thanks!!