I made a bait pile for coyotes and they won't touch it. It's a couple deer that got hit on the road and a goat that died. This isn't the first time I've noticed them avoiding large piles. Is it just because they're well fed right now or are large piles a mistake in general?

Probably a bit of abundance of food and warm temps. I’ve had best results on piles in really cold weather and a decent snow coverage.

Might be able to catch them by backing way back from the pile. Like a 1/4 mile back depending on terrain.

Some good looking, intelligent, talented trapper wrote an article about that a few months back in the Trappers Post.

Until the ground freezes hard, most bait piles will generate just a passing interest. It usually isn't until the cold precludes many other food sources that coyotes start to get hungry enough to eat a bait piles. In addition, the location of the bait pile may also affect the interest levels of the coyotes. Generally they like to be able to have good visibility for possible danger. So that may be one reason they aren't aggressive at your bait pile.

One other issue is that some baits, for whatever reason, just never get hit. Don't ask me why. I've had dead cows that get cleaned up, down to nothing but some bones, lying right next to a cow they won't touch. I know some people believe antibiotics or whatever in livestock will cause coyotes to shy away, but I've other situations where a bait isn't touched, but I drag it a mile away and it get hammered the next day.

Sorry, one other thought. DON'T SET YOUR TRAPS UNTIL THEY START EATING ON THE BAIT!

Often the presence of the bait and your traps, triggers the "this is too good to be true" response and coyotes shy away.

I have a field I dump my hogs and coyotes won’t touch them.
We had an EHD deer I hauled to the field and the buzzards didn’t even touch it, it’s still decomposing. We found a deer dead in a thick drain while coon hunting that was intact but stinking…nothing had touched it.
IF we get any cold weather, I’ll take a deer to the field and strip it down as leave the rest and see if that gets a response.
I haven’t found anything dead our coyotes will touch. And some things the buzzards won’t even touch.

Ive experienced that

Our farm dogs absolutely love beaver feet, but I dumped a gunny sack full out in the Oregon desert one time and came back 3 weeks later and they hadn't been touched! So that was a head scratcher for me. On the other hand I've place beaver carcasses out there and they usually don't last more than a day or two.

Just like your dog a well fed coyote well eat it's stomach full at least twice a day if the food is available. And the coyotes survival instinct causes it to take easiest highest nutrient meal available if all else is equal. Some would say it's antibiotics if it was cattle carcasses which I haven't seen that to be a factor.
Your coyotes are spooked of that pile. My experience from watching a lot of carcasses eaten and not eaten is that the most likely factor is human scent and the oddity of multiple carcasses in one spot. Cold and hunger will definitely help them overcome their caution. Some will argue with me on human scent because coyotes are around it a lot in a lot of places and because we can catch coyotes in first night sets but not all coyotes act the same and they can act in very strange ways.

As previously stated I've watched coyote behavior alot at dead carcasses and feel pretty strongly about my theory

I haven't trapped the pile yet. I wanted to create a "jackpot" like boco talked about with 10 snares around a pile. I put it in a very brushy area, maybe I should put it somewhere more open.

For bigger canines like wolf and I assume coyotes you need to keep your snares a lot further back from the jackpot.No closer than 50 yards.
Not close like 20 feet for fox or cats.

Coyotes will often circle a baitpile for quite some time before committing to it. They will run a circle around it about 15 yards out. This is where you set your traps until they commit. Scent posts work well here. If you look closely often times you can see where they burn a trail in the grass. Enough that there will be a color difference in the grass next summer.

That said, it might take a long while before they need to commit. I had one bait pile set out with a sheep and 2 deer. Nothing touched until the middle of February. Then it was all consumed in 2 weeks time....so you have to keep an eye on it.

Works best it the worst weather it’s a cold winters when they shine.

Now's a good time to get them out. But with the nice weather you won't see much activity. When the temps hit close to zero the activity will pick up. I put out two piles the beginning of the week now that rifle season is over but don't expect much until snow and cold.

Cold weather increases caloric need and intake....warm weather not so much needed fur getting warm so not travelling as much. really not hard to figure.

What I've found around my area, which normally we don't have long periods of freezing weather to contend with, is that coyotes avoid bait piles with a passion. They may check them out from a distance, but very seldom if ever actually come in to the bait pile / carcass dump and eat. I've put road kill, skinned carcasses and other 'stuff' out, put up cameras, and have had a grand total of 1 coyote on the pile, a mangy pup that looked like it was starving.
Like others have said, set a couple hundred yards out for the coyotes. Traps near the bait piles, at least around my area, take out the possums and skunks, but too close and you've got buzzards to contend with.

Another thing, around here, anyway, a coon carcass, either skinned or not, will rot away with nothing touching it, while a possum will be shredded the first day / night. Deer carcasses and beaver are the same as coons, nothing but buzzards and possums. Strange?

If the carcasses are rotting they know it's there. That it's self is an attractant that can produce a good distance away. How many yotes are in the area your trapping? If there ain't a lot it will take a long time for them to hit it hard. If there is abundant prey it may take awhile. Deer season gut piles and lost deer factor in. If it's a new dead pile there may be only a couple of yotes in the area.

Donnersurvivor—-the above quote is pretty similar with what I experience here. Like you’ve seen I also seldom see much interest in bait piles. Minor things I can do to impact that such as where I locate the food, how much food leave etc but I consider the big items to be 1) number of critters around 2) amount of food available and 3) what I consider the seasonality effect.

Limited critter population here. Surely impacts how quick a pile is found. But I also think it drives some lack of interest. When I see locations that have been worked hard it’s a group. I’m sure it’s same as feeding a group of dogs—- more of them you’ve got the quicker and more kibble they compete for and gorge on. Another component of this is that the limited supply of coyotes is constantly pressured from too many bad human encounters at least here. So those that are cruising your area may approach with great caution finding your bait but staying out 100 yards on first driveby. The second return visit will be 10-15 days later and then they may cut distance down but even then likely don’t show much interest other than brief pause. We’ve also seen these different responses to humans fir years when calling. In many midwestern lications there will be certain places that are coyote producing factories. Setup on the travel ways out if thise locales and the behavior particularly of dispersing pups is much different than pressured adults. So I’d keep in mind how many coyotes you have and the age class.

Tons of food in the ag lands of Midwest from big varmints to tiny ones. A critter might be hungry when it wakes at night but my opinion is that hardly anything ever goes hungry for any length of time. This place rivals most any place in country for # of deer and you won’t make it a mile in any direction without finding a roadkill. Food is not scarce here most of the year and our weather is relatively mild. Likely less cold and snow than you have. However it seems to me that coyotes do maintain an inventory list of the available food stores out in their territory in case they need to hit it up during bad times. Firearms deer season opened yesterday. That’ll impact local movement for a couple of weeks

Lastly I notice critters use large carcasses on a seasonal needs basis. For fur trappers that registers for us as cold winter. But I bet if we had lots of adc coyote trappers here they might weigh in differently. The times of year when I see large food sources hit is nit winter at all

Coyotes are jerks, one day they may just jump on the bait and start hitting it. I agree with Lazuras though don’t set traps until they start

I one time made a stand calling coyotes in eastern Oregon where the highway dept routinely dumped roadhit critters (mostly deer). I had 9 coyotes come in from 4 different directions within 3 minutes. So coyotes were just loving this place and camping out nearby.

Garden of eden