PHOTO BY DAVID LOWE Mary Hood herds sheep inside an enclosure of about two acres where she and her husband, Charles Hood, keep their livestock at night in an effort to prevent coyote attacks. Charles Hood has tried just about everything: trapping, putting out cyanide, designing snares and spotlighting. Nothing seems to have helped the Lometa-area rancher protect his sheep from coyote attacks.

Hood, who raises about 200 dorper cross sheep at his ranch in Long Cove in northwestern Lampasas County, has lost nearly 40 ewes and lambs since March. In some weeks he and his wife, Mary, have found multiple livestock killed.

Calculating the sheep the couple have lost at about $50 a head -- although in a good year a lamb can bring $80 to $90 in the spring -- Hood estimates coyotes have deprived him of more than $1,800 in income this year. Tax deductions are available for sheep he buys that eventually die before reaching market, Hood said. The rancher said he does not receive government disaster aid, however, for livestock born on his ranch that later succumb to predators.

PHOTO BY DAVID LOWE Although predators pose a perennial problem for Lampasas County sheep and goat ranchers, Charles and Mary Hood's sheep herd has faced increased attacks this year by coyotes. Jackie Chapman, who raises sheep for wool at his ranch on McCreaville Road, also knows the financial losses coyotes cause livestock raisers. Chapman has battled coyotes "forever," he said, and every night hears the howls of a pack he expects to move from a neighbor's property across the road to his ranch in search of food.

Although each pack has its own unique habits when it eats sheep, Chapman said coyotes always target young animals, which have the tenderest meat -- and make the most money at auctions.

"It's kind of like an old lumberjack," Chapman said. "There's no sense cutting down a bad tree. They just go for the best tree."

Coyotes hunt as families, Chapman said, with as many as five pups accompanying their parents.

Mark Langford, who raises mohair goats between Adamsville and Rumley, has noted an increase in attacks during the last three weeks. At this point in the fall, young coyotes usually begin to learn to hunt with their parents, Langford said.

"There's only one thing a coyote likes better than a little sheep or goat, and that's a baby deer," he said.

Coyotes have been known not only to kill fawns but also to work in groups to exhaust and subdue yearling deer, Langford said.

Because attacks do not follow a specific pattern, ranchers must be prepared at all times for their livestock to face danger.

"You just know you're going to lose them," Chapman said.

As a result, Hood and his wife begin driving across their ranch with a spotlight every day at 9 p.m. They repeat their vigil every two hours until daylight, hoping to prevent attacks on their animals.

At times, though, Hood has awoken to find a freshly killed ewe or lamb.

"It's not often enough," he said of his and his wife's patrols.

The Hoods have seen -- and shot at -- a coyote on their property, but hunting has not stopped predation. Hood doesn't know how many predators are pursuing his livestock, but he guesses as many as six coyotes could be roaming the area.

Although he said he has "always had problems" with coyotes, Hood attributes the increase in attacks partly to the division and sale of neighboring properties. The days of sheep ranches larger than 1,000 acres -- with livestock producers on site full time to resist predators -- are ending as landowners split their properties into smaller parcels and sell them as hunting ranches.

Neighbors "are real cooperative" with Hood's attempts to eradicate coyotes, he said, and allow him to spotlight on their land. In order to maintain good feelings with his neighbors, though, Hood does not patrol at two-hour intervals every night, as he does on his ranch.

"I don't want to be on my neighbors' property at all hours of the night bothering them," he said.

Coyotes roam within a four- to five-mile area, Hood said. The rancher suspects the animals may be traveling to his land from other ranches in search of easy prey.

In a quick attempt to catch predators, Hood designed a trap out of 20-foot cattle panels. He has been leaving bait inside the pen for a few weeks, hoping coyotes will try to dig in and will hang themselves on the snares on the sides of the trap.

So far, his plan has not worked.

A government trapper has had better results, catching two coyotes at the Hoods' property. Chapman and the Hoods take sheep to a Goldthwaite auction, which Chapman said charges a five-cent fee per sheep to fund the United States Department of Agriculture trappers' work.

In addition, Lampasas County funds half the trappers' salaries, Precinct 3 Commissioner Lowell Ivey said. The Lampasas County Commissioners Court likely will maintain that level of funding, Ivey said, because most of the commissioners work in agriculture and understand ranchers' challenges with predators. Trappers have assisted at Ivey's ranch, where the commissioner a few years ago lost 10 lambs in just a few nights.

Professional predator control services, which Chapman said he uses almost every day, have helped mitigate livestock losses at his land. The rancher noted that trappers sometimes have to pursue a coyote for as long as two months before catching it.

Despite successful trapping at the Hood ranch, sheep killings have continued.

Hood recently constructed a two-acre penned area in which to keep his sheep -- which he said are displaying increasingly nervous behavior -- during the night. Newborn lambs may be confined to the pen for as long as a month, as Hood said young sheep seem to have been targeted the most.

The rancher hopes his four- to six-foot-high panel walls will reduce attacks by coyotes, although he worries the predators will crawl under the fence he spent two days building.

So far, the strategy has protected the sheep at night, although one animal was killed in the morning as Hood tried to release the last of the herd from the enclosure.

As Hood has increased his efforts, coyotes have responded less and less to his calls.

"They're sneaky," he said. "Everything they do is on a different basis, so you can't plan for how to catch them. That's why it's so hard to get rid of them."

Mike Potts learned that lesson during years of raising sheep and goats northeast of Lometa for a number of years. Predators "finally ran me out of the business," he said, although Potts has had better results since he resumed raising sheep about a year ago. The rancher has a herd of about 125 dorper crosses and has devised a fairly successful defensive plan from a mix of traps and dogs.

A USDA trapper has caught about five coyotes, several wild hogs -- which can kill young sheep and goats as well as fawns -- some bobcats and a red fox or two on Potts' property, the rancher said. The trapper's service has reduced coyote attacks on livestock significantly, Potts added.

"I don't know what we'd do without our two county trappers," he said.

Potts does not try to call in and shoot coyotes, as the trapper who works on his land told him an inexperienced caller can make the predators less likely to respond, even to a trained hunter.

Potts used to pen his sheep before he had guard dogs. Now, however, two male dogs stay with the herd to provide 24-hour protection, and coyote problems have lessened, he said.

Great Pyrenees, Anatolian shepherds and crosses between the two breeds make good guard dogs, Potts said. Livestock raisers can benefit, the rancher added, from buying a young dog with working parents.

A guard dog also has prevented attacks on livestock at Bill and Stacy Pauly's Long Cove ranch, Mrs. Pauly said.

Langford also considers guard dogs a good tool for coyote management, although they are not a perfect solution.

Langford and Hood both said the possibility of a dog accidentally getting snared concerns them. As a result, Langford said trappers are somewhat limited at his property because of his dogs. Hood works his sheep with five dogs during the day but keeps them close to home at night to prevent them from accidentally getting trapped.

When predators populate an area too densely, they can overwhelm ranch dogs, Langford added.

"They're kind of like people," he said. "If they have a chance they'll try, but if they don't have a chance they won't even try."

Chapman's guard dog has helped protect his livestock, but he said finding the right working dog can be difficult.

"You've got to go through 50 to get one good one," Chapman said.

While not as common a remedy, aerial hunting also can help with predator removal. Langford found the method useful when he faced a particularly difficult coyote problem at a South Texas operation.

Ivey noted that trappers shooting from a helicopter killed 17 coyotes on a hill at his ranch.

A 20-cent levy on each animal sold at auctions generates funds for the Sheep and Goat Predator Management Board. The producerfunded body offers aerial hunting assistance in cooperation with government trappers, along with cost-sharing for qualifying ranchers, said Langford, a former board member.

Sheep still provide a good avenue to agricultural profit, Hood said -- if ranchers can prevent losses due to predators.

"It's a money-making proposition if we can keep the coyotes off them," he said.

Like many ranchers, the Hoods will have to continue their search for a predator solution.