PHOTO © Karin Saucedo

PHOTO © Karin Saucedo

THE NORTH AMERICAN COYOTE

Coyotes are intelligent and adaptable North American canids that are found in all states in the U.S. except Hawaii since the early 21st century. They have become well established in nearly every ecosystem, thriving in grasslands, swamps, deserts, tundra, forests, cities and suburbs.

Their expansion is largely due to anthropogenic (human-created) changes over the last century. Through the clear-cutting of forests for human settlement in early 20th century and the subsequent decline of larger predators due to extensive predator control campaigns, coyotes were able to successfully expand their range east across North America.

People can live among coyotes yet never see them. Often it’s only a group heard howling or their prints in the mud along a riparian area that confirms their presence not too far from our neighborhoods. It is important to keep in mind that coyotes have been interacting with and adapting to people for hundreds of years.

ECOLOGICAL IMPORTANCE

Where coyotes are prevalent they are a keystone species, meaning their presence or absence plays a significant role in our ecosystems. Even if living in fragmented or urban landscapes, coyotes have an important role and help to maintain species diversity.

Coyotes are opportunistic omnivores. They eat a side variety of food and offer free rodent control by feeding on mice and rats, while helping to keep the populations of certain species that live on the edge of human-dominated areas or within the suburbs in check (like raccoons, Canada geese, nutria).

It is important to note that coyotes do not overpopulate nor does their population need to be controlled, as many people believe. Coyotes, and all top predators, self-regulate their populations and will only produce as many coyotes as an area can support through resources like food, water, and shelter. Killing coyotes does not work as a control option in the long run, and is not sustainable.

According to Project Coyote:

“Why is killing ineffective and ecologically disruptive? Coyotes’ remarkable success appears to be closely related to human attempts to control their numbers. Unexploited coyote populations are self-regulating based on the availability of food, habitat, and territorial defense by resident family groups. Typically, only the parents (the ‘dominant pair’) in a family of coyotes reproduce, and they behaviorally suppress reproduction among subordinate members of the group (Gese 2005, Knowlton 1972, Knowlton et al 1999, Sacks 2005).

Lethal control can disrupt coyote families, breaking them up, allowing more coyotes to reproduce, encouraging larger litter sizes because of decreased competition for food and habitat, and increasing pup survival rates (Goodrich and Buskirk 1995; Crabtree & Sheldon 1999; Kilgo et al. 2017, Knowlton et al. 1999).

More critically, with the disruption of pack structure, learning across generations of coyotes that promotes consumption of wild prey can be compromised and increase killing of domesticated animals (Crabtree and Sheldon 1999; Mitchel et al, 2004). Additionally, the void created by removing coyotes who are not causing conflicts may be filled by other coyotes who may be less wary of humans and cause conflicts (Conner et al. 1998, Fox 2006, Gehrt 2004, Sacks 1999b, Shivik 2014).

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QUICK FACTS ABOUT COYOTES:

  • Mainly active from dusk to dawn, but can be out during the day. This is not cause for alarm.

  • They can occupy areas on the edges of human-created places like golf courses, baseball fields, graveyards, neighborhoods that back directly up to greenbelts, canals, and wooded areas.

  • They are attracted to neighborhoods by food sources (pet food, trash, birdseed, fruit tree droppings, compost, dirty BBQ grills, and unfortunately, outside pets). It is our responsibility to keep these resources in check if we do not want coyotes roaming our neighborhoods. These components are within our control.

  • Coyotes are not naturally aggressive towards people and try to stay clear of us.

  • Healthy coyotes do not attack humans and instead will stay away from us. They fear us naturally.

  • They travel and live in small family groups or in mated pairs. They are excellent parents and mate for life.

  • They do travel alone as transients after leaving their natal territory to seek out their own territory and a mate.

  • Coyotes are here to stay. The most successful efforts to avoid and prevent coyote conflict in cities involve public outreach and education on how to safely coexist.

Don’t want coyotes in your neighborhood? Learn how to stop being such a good host below.

SHAREABLE RESOURCES

Download and share our comprehensive guide:

Download our PDF Here: Coyote Co-existence Deterrence PDF

Single sheet PDFs From The Humane Society of the United States website:

DISTEMPER AND RABIES IN THE USA

Some wildlife diseases can be transmitted to humans and our domestic pets. While rabies is rare in the United States, it does exist and is contagious to humans and pets.

Canine Distemper is a fairly common and highly contagious wildlife disease across the USA and our unvaccinated pets can contract this disease.

Read more below on how to keep you, your family, and your pets safe.

OTHER WILDLIFE DISEASES IN THE USA

ORPHANED OR INJURED WILDLIFE

Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Info:

Have a question or concern regarding coyotes? Are you in Louisiana and want to report a sighting?

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