Coyote Hunting Manitoba, Laws, Regulations, Season, & License Info

Classification

What is the classification of coyotes in Manitoba?

Coyote is a fur bearing animal, and it is named in the statute rather than left to a regulation. The Wildlife Act’s Schedule A splits wild animals into divisions, and the two that matter are the first two:¹

• Division 1 — Big Game: moose, elk, barren-ground caribou, woodland caribou, white-tailed deer, mule deer, black bear, gray (timber) wolf
• Division 2 — Fur Bearing Animals: beaver, weasels, coyote, fisher, foxes, river otter, badger, bobcat, marten, mink, muskrat, red squirrel, wolverine, raccoon, lynx

Coyote is not big game in Manitoba, and the gray wolf is. Hold on to that, because it decides two of the most important answers on this page — and because Manitoba then turns round and makes you buy a big game licence anyway.

The licence, and there is no coyote one

Is a hunting licence required to hunt coyotes in Manitoba?

Yes, and it is a big game licence. There is no coyote licence in Manitoba. There is no coyote tag. What the regulation says is that a resident holding a valid mule deer, white-tailed deer, elk, moose, caribou or black bear licence for the current hunting year may hunt coyote.²

The guide puts it plainly: “Gray wolves and coyotes can be hunted under the authority of any big game licence. There are no tagging requirements for wolves or coyotes. The hunter’s big game licence number is all that is required to possess a wolf or coyote taken under the authority of that licence.”³

That is a genuinely unusual arrangement, and it is worth stating in reverse so nobody misreads it: you cannot buy a licence in Manitoba that lets you hunt only coyotes. Coyote hunting is something a big game licence lets you also do.

For a Manitoba resident the rule then splits on whether a big game season is running where you are standing:³

• Where a big game season is open in that GHA — you must hold the licence for that species and an unused game tag valid for that area, species and time period
• Where big game seasons are closed — a used or unused licence is enough

So the tag you already filled on a deer still authorizes coyote hunting once the deer season shuts. It does not authorize it while the deer season is running.

Season and the bag limit

What is the season for coyote hunting in Manitoba?

31 August to the last day of February, in all Game Hunting Areas except Area 38.⁴

What is the bag limit for coyotes in Manitoba?

One.

That is not a typo and it is not a per-day figure. Schedule H sets the coyote bag limit at 1 coyote for the season, province-wide.⁴

Coming from anywhere in the western United States this is the single hardest thing to believe on this page. British Columbia has no bag limit in seven of its eight regions. Alberta has none at all. Saskatchewan has none. Manitoba allows you one coyote a year, and it does so because the animal is not being managed as a pest here — it is a furbearer with a season, sitting in the same schedule as marten and lynx.

If you want volume, this is the wrong province, and that is worth knowing before you plan a trip rather than after.

Non-residents

Can a non-resident hunt coyotes in Manitoba?

Only as an add-on to a guided big game hunt. Manitoba is the most restrictive of the western provinces on this, and there are two separate requirements stacked on top of each other.⁵

“Non-Canadian resident” means you if you are American. A “Canadian resident” is someone from another province; a “Manitoba resident” is local. The three are treated differently.

“A non-Canadian resident may only hunt coyotes if they possess a white-tailed deer, moose, black bear or caribou licence and unused game tag (personal or party), which is valid for the fall hunting season in that area, species and time period.”⁵

And then:

“A non-Canadian resident gray wolf and coyote hunter must be accompanied by a licensed Manitoba guide. No more than four hunters may use the services of a guide at the same time.”⁵

Read those together and the practical answer is stark. As an American you cannot come to Manitoba to hunt coyotes. You can come to hunt deer, moose, bear or caribou with a licensed guide, carrying an unused tag, and shoot a coyote while you are there — up to one.

A Canadian resident from another province needs the same species licence but the guide requirement is written for non-Canadian residents.

The federal side — the firearm declaration, the $25 fee, and what a past conviction does to your trip — is on the Canada regulations index.

Night, lights and optics

Can you hunt coyotes at night in Manitoba?

No, and Manitoba backs the prohibition with a deeming provision that catches people before they ever fire a shot.

The hours rule is in the General Hunting Regulation:

“No person shall hunt wildlife between 1/2 hour after sunset and 1/2 hour before sunrise of the following day.”⁶

Then The Wildlife Act adds that a person is deemed to be hunting at night if they, or anyone in their company, direct an artificial light at night into an area where a vertebrate animal may reasonably be expected to be found, while in possession of or with ready access to a firearm.⁷

That is a spotlighting presumption. You do not have to shoot anything, or even see anything. A light swept across a field at night with a rifle in the truck is the offence as written. Scanning with a light while you decide whether to set up is exactly the behaviour it describes.

Can you use night vision or thermal in Manitoba?

Manitoba’s statute and guide do not name night vision, thermal or infrared. But since hunting is closed at night and the light provision is drawn as widely as it is, there is no lawful night hunt for the optic to serve. Do not read the silence as permission — and if you want a definitive answer for daytime use, phone Natural Resources rather than infer one.

Firearms

Can you use a rimfire for coyotes in Manitoba?

Yes, and this is the first place the classification pays off. The General Hunting Regulation prohibits hunting “big game with a firearm requiring rimfire cartridges.”⁸ Coyote is a fur bearing animal, not big game, so the restriction does not reach it.

Federal law still governs the firearm itself — suppressors are prohibited devices, and magazine limits turn on what the magazine was designed for. That is on the Canada index, and it is another quiet argument for a bolt gun north of the border.

Do you have to wear hunter orange?

Not always, and coyote hunters get a specific exemption: “Wolf and coyote hunters are exempt in hunting areas while no other big game season is on.”⁹

Read the condition, not just the exemption. While a big game season is running in that area — which is exactly when your unused tag makes coyote hunting lawful — the orange requirement applies.

Calls and bait

Are electronic calls allowed for coyote hunting in Manitoba?

Yes, and this is the second place the classification decides the answer. The prohibition reads:

“No person shall hunt wild turkeys or big game, other than gray (timber) wolves, with electronic recorded calls.”⁸

The scope is wild turkeys and big game. Gray wolf is big game, which is why it needed naming as an exception. Coyote is a furbearer, so it was never inside the prohibition to begin with and needs no exception.

That is the fourth different mechanism across four provinces for the same practical answer — British Columbia names coyote as an exception, Alberta names it and specifies the permitted sounds, Saskatchewan scopes the ban to waterfowl, and Manitoba scopes it to big game. Same outcome, four different routes, and none of them obvious from a quick read. See the best coyote call for what to run.

Is baiting allowed for coyote hunting in Manitoba?

Yes, with real conditions. Baits must be clearly identified with the name and address of the hunter, guide or outfitter, and may not be placed:³

• Within 200 metres of a road or dwelling
• Within 500 metres of a cottage subdivision, Crown land picnic site or campground
• Within 100 metres of Riding Mountain National Park, in GHAs 23 and 23A

Baits on Crown land may not exceed 100 kilograms of meat or fish, and must not contain the head, hooves, hide, mammary glands or internal organs of livestock. In GHAs 23 and 23A bait may not go out until 14 days before the season, and equipment must be off Crown land within 5 days of the season closing.

After the shot

Can you take a coyote out of Manitoba?

Yes, and more easily than most things. No game tag is required to export a wolf or coyote taken under a big game licence during the 30 days following the kill date — the big game licence that authorized the take is all that is needed to possess or export it.¹⁰

Two conditions on that window. During those 30 days only the licence holder may export it. After 30 days, or if somebody else is carrying it out on your behalf, an export permit is required.

A CITES permit is required to export a gray wolf outside Canada. Coyote is not CITES-listed, so it does not need one — a distinction worth getting right if you are carrying both.

Coyotes in Manitoba

Where are the coyotes, and how does Manitoba manage them?

The management posture is visible in the paperwork rather than in a population statement. Coyote sits in Schedule A Division 2 with the marten, the fisher and the lynx — a furbearer with a defined season and a bag limit of one — rather than in the pest category its neighbours use.

But Manitoba does deal with problem animals, and it does it through a named programme rather than a bounty or a liberal season.

The Targeted Predator Removal Program

Manitoba runs predator removal under an agreement with the Manitoba Trappers Association, aimed only at animals “causing livestock losses or … considered an elevated threat to human safety.” The scale is published:

“In 2024/25, 94 service requests were addressed, with 473 coyotes, 54 wolves and 24 foxes removed.”¹¹

That is the province’s answer to depredation — targeted removal by trappers, on request — and it explains why the recreational bag limit can sit at one without livestock producers being left without a remedy. There is no coyote bounty in Manitoba, and neither the guide nor the trapping guide mentions hunting contests.

Manitoba has also moved on trapping method: power-assisted snares are now permitted for coyotes and red foxes in the Open Area Trapping Zones, on the Fur Institute of Canada’s finding that they kill a coyote more quickly than common snares.¹¹

Coyote health in Manitoba

Two things worth knowing before you handle fur, both reported by the province:¹¹

• Distemper appears to have passed into coyotes, based on reports from the southern Interlake
• Dog lice has increased in coyotes in southern Manitoba, and now in wolves. Patches of missing fur over the shoulders, from scratching and rubbing, are the tell

A rubbed, patchy hide in the southern Interlake is more likely to be lice than a poor winter coat, and it is worth knowing what you are looking at before you decide whether a pelt is worth skinning.

When is coyote mating season in Manitoba?

Manitoba publishes no species account. The nearest authoritative Canadian source is British Columbia’s furbearer management guidelines, which put breeding at early February to mid-March, pups born in April and May and later further north, after a 60 to 63 day gestation.¹² Cited here as the closest published Canadian source rather than as a Manitoba one — nothing in the Manitoba material contradicts it.

Note that Manitoba’s season closes at the end of February, so the back half of the breeding window falls outside it.