Where did the coyotes come from?

[mrawesome22]

My ex-father in law, claims he killed a coyote that had an odnr tattoo on its tongue.

I generally considered him a honest man, but..... that one is kinda hard to swallow.

But the coyote population has exploded here in Ohio these last few years for sure.

Whether the odnr has anything to do with that, I do not know.

[HShack]

I have heard that fox hunters here in SC have brought yotes in as they are much cheaper than foxes.

[tony101]

thats what they did in NC they put them in the fox pins in a couple counties and thats wheir they started showing up.Now they r in all 100 counties

[HOGSHOOTER]

Love to shoot those coyotes.they are what kepts me sane in the off season.HOGSHOOTER

[BIG P]

Population expand I think, I would'nt complain near as much if the blame things would eat pigs instead of Deer would you?

[Nnobby45]

Coyote hunting is incredibly fun, but I don't think it will have a real impact. Maybe at first if they are not used to hunters.

Correct. Coyote populations are cyclic and tend to coincide with upward trends in rabbit populations. Nothing wrong with hunting them, but it isn't likely to reduce their populations unless temporarily. Reduce their populations and nature has given them the ability to reproduce even faster.

Populations tend to regulate themselves. The only thing that really reduced them was government trapping using cyanide traps on public land. No telling how many hunting dogs were also lost, as well as other wildlife, as well.

[Irish B]

Coyotes were not shipped in. Its a response to the lack of apex predator in the area. Wolves control coyote populations. Without wolves we have massive coyote over populations. The population will continue to increase too. People whine and moan about how bad wolves are for the environment and they kill all the livestock so we need to get rid of wolves but then they dont stop and think how that will affect the ecosystem. As soon as you get rid of wolves you're going to have a coyote problem. The difference is packs of coyotes don't have the same natural fear of people that packs of wolves do. Not only that but wolves will not adapt to live in urban environments like coyotes will. Coyotes are NOT destroying deer populations. Its very rare for a coyote or even a pack of coyotes to hunt a healthy deer. They usually take sick or weak animals and most of the time they hunt small pest game. Also coyotes only live in packs the first 2 to 3 years of there life, after which they move on to either a solitary lifestyle or pair up with a mate and the two separate from the pack for good. A lot of places, especially out here in colorado, coyotes are shot as pests. Most people go out and will shoot them just for target practice. They dont eat the meat neither do they use any part of the animal. Usually they just leave them there right where they shot them. The problem with killing every possible coyote in sight is that 98% of the coyotes diet are pest animals. Rats, mice, rabbits, etc. When we see a decline in coyote populations we see an incline in rodent populations and also an incline in diseases that are associated with rodents such as hantavirus, plague, tularemia, lepto, etc.

If they could only realize how much of a better chance of getting a trophy game animal would be during its season if the yote population was down sized year-round. The yotes kill game animals year-round.

You're joking if you think coyote populations are directly affecting trophy game populations. It is extremely rare for a pack of coyotes to take down a healthy strong trophy buck. Like I said above these animals hunt the sick and the weak. Only a starving pack of coyotes would go after a trophy buck. Here in my little slice of Colorado we have no more wolves and we have not a lot of coyotes. Because of this we have deer EVERYWHERE. We have to rely on bear and lion to control the deer population. On any given day you may see 10 to 20 deer in town just hanging out. The lions wont hunt the deer close to town and the bears have gotten so lazy that they just dumpster dive and we usually go after the trophy bucks or does so the deer populations are at an all time high around here. They're practically pets. Back when I used to work as a medic in the er a few years ago we had a lady come in who was attacked by a buck who tried to wander it's way into her house. To sum all this up coyotes do have an impact on deer population but not directly to trophy buck populations and certainly not to the scale of wiping out deer population. I'm an avid hunter and gun enthusiast but i'm also a wildlife veterinary and environmental biology student so I get to see both sides of the story.

[rickyrick]

While it would be nice to be able to shoot coyotes on sight, that scenario rarely presents itself. For the most part where I live coyote shooting requires some effort.

You can occasionally have a gun in your hand and a coyote crosses your path.
I have long advocated the fact that coyotes are not the most damaging animals out there, they do have to be dealt with.

When you find an animal that you reared from birth with its guts strewn about the place, you tend to wanna have someone deal with it. You can keep problem animals excluded from certain areas just by killing a few of them.

[shortwave]

Your joking if you think coyote populations are directly affecting trophy game population....

I understand coyotes won't jump on a mature buck but I have seen first hand cases in which yotes will separate a doe and her fawn only to kill the fawn. In one recent case, last summer watched three yotes separate a doe and her twins. By the time I got back to where they were, the yotes had already downed the fawn. Fawn was making an awful sound. Ended up shooting one of the yotes the others got away.

No, the yotes won't jump on that mature trophy buck but they will kill fawns that can turn into those trophy bucks. Let the yotes over populate and the deer herd will thin out affecting deer herd down the road. They will also tag-team a full grown healthy doe, running her to exhaustion.

Too, if not controlled, they can/will devastate a turkey population.

Yotes do kill rodents, the weak and sick but they are predators/opportunity killers and will kill healthy animals as well when given the opportunity. Just ask any farmer with livestock.

Fact is, here in Ohio, there are no natural predators for them and they are affecting game animals in this state. They are over-populated and running in larger and larger packs making them bolder and bolder...to the point they are often seen in the suburbs. I understand the yotes roll in the wild but I also know what they can do if there's no check and balance for controlling them.

[jdscholer]

Well, lets cut the talkin, and get with the squakkin. jd

[shortwave]

jdscholar,

You are 'the wind beneath my wings'!

[mrawesome22]

Early in the bow season, it was just barely light enough to see, I was walking to my stand. Heard a hell of a racket coming down the ravine to my right. Flew down the hill, crossed the crick, and started coming up the other side straight at me.

A nice buck ran past me at about 15 feet:O The coyote chasing it stopped about 5 feet from me lol. When I tried to get an arrow out of my hip quiver, it saw me and bolted

First time I ever saw a coyote chasing a mature buck. It was much more intense than I can bescribe here.

I killed that coyote about a month later while sitting in my stand. Big female with the dirtiest, matted up pelt I ever saw.

Old girl had some kahunas lol.

[bamaranger]

I have seen 'yotes running fawns, often, especially early in bow season.
Hunting in bunches, some running the fawn, others flanking and circling, hoping to blindside bambi.

I have run up on fawns recently killed, that almost had to have been takenmoments before, that I attribute to 'yotes.

And I have seen more than one family bunch of deer skidaddle right back into the thick stuff at dusk, upon hearing 'yotes in the distance.

I've killed several coming into turkey calls, and bumped another as it manuevered on a gobbling tom (I was doing same!) An acquaintance has had 'yotes roll his turkey decoys.

On a prime night, w/ 2-3 or more bunches howlng, I wonder, "Just how many am I hearing.?"

Heck of a predator, and now very common.
Heck of a predator.

[Mainah]

Here in Maine the theory is that they came from Canada, and cross-bred with wolves during that migration. That's why Eastern Coyotes are bigger than those you find out west. I've seen a couple that could have, in terms of size, passed for German Shepherds here in Maine. The ones that I've seen out west were smaller.

Personally I think that they filled a gap that was created by the elimination of apex predators on the East Coast. I think that they spread in areas south of Maine by moving south, and by moving east. And I suspect that in twenty years we'll be able to track the very same behavior in cougars, without the wolf cross-breeding. I really don't want to be an old man facing a Crowlf in the back yard.

[stevelyn]

We have them in Alaska and their range has been constantly expanding. Two have been seen down here on the AKPEN since 2005. One I saw myself.

Our learned biologist monkeys at ADF&G speculate that they basically started migrating up through Canada during construction of the ALCAN Hwy back in the early 40s. Others speculate that they crossed over the border from Canada pre-ALCAN along the SE panhandle and expanded north.

Considering they don't recognize lines on a map or the AK-Canada border and just go wherever they wish, either theory is possible and likely.

ADF&G manages them as furbearers so we don't have open seasons on them like a lot of L48 states do.

[thallub]

In SW Oklahoma coyotes kill at least one third of the fawns born every year. Kill those coyotes.

[ltc444]

The coyote was orginally a marginal desert predator. They operated in the area were the wolf was not present.

When we eliminated the wolf they moved in to fill the void. For years the Miss. River served as a barrier to their expansion. When they learned to use the bridges, expanded dramatically.

To understand the impact on the deer population one must look at the effect they have had on the antelope population in AZ and Idaho.

Their hunting technique is to identify a Doe who is ready to drop her calf. They follow her and have been video taped by Idaho game management biologist literally pulling the calf out of the Doe. This hunting practice is devastating on the Antelope population.

The Antelope herd in the area were I live is about 50 animals. My neighbors and I counted only 2 fawns from the 2011 crop. AZ Fish and game has opened coyotes to night hunting in certain Antelope Management areas in order to increase the Antelope population.

Additionally, they are scavangers and have learned to live in close quarters with humans. In addition to the garbage and handouts generated by humans, they found that domestic animals, cats and dogs, are tasty.

I apologize if I used improper terms for Antelope. I still have not learned the correct terminology.

[shortwave]

posted by Itc444:

Their hunting technique is to identify a Doe who is ready to drop her calf. They follow her and have been video taped by Idaho game management biologist literally pulling the calf out of the Doe.

Well said Itc444

Yotes also regularly use this technique on cows, sheep and other domestic livestock. To the point that if there's a herd of cows in the pasture and a birthing cow is down, the herd has learned if yotes show up, the other cows will form a circle around the birthing cow trying to protect her.
Some times it works...sometimes not.

[rickyrick]

Speaking of which, if the cows are accustomed to your presence pay attention when you call, they are pretty good at knowing where they are. Donkeys even better, with those radar dish ears

[ripnbst]

Coyotes have no natural predators in most of the country which is why they are such a problem.

[firebird74521]

I spent my youth in rural areas near Toronto Canada and 40 years ago if someone said they saw a Coyote they were laughed at and told to learn the difference between a Coyote and a Shepard. There were no real Coyote sighting for almost 100 years in our area. Today they are every where. They became a problem in the late 1990's but a mange wiped out the majority of them and now they are back again with a vengeance and right in the middle of town. My old hunting grounds are now all developed into expensive housing and there are miles of wooded ravines and hiking and biking trails that run right behind million $$ homes. A young girl was bitten here recently by a Coyote on a trail. He was tracked and shot. That was the first bite recorded but there are many reporting of small dogs taken right of of leashes and posters of missing cats are common near the ravines. They no longer fear humans here and I have seen a Coyote crossing a busy 4lane road and carefully watching for traffic then wander up to a bus shelter, stick his head in to look at the 3 people inside then wander away in to the bush trails. He had no fear of people at all. Dogs are not always that smart. Coyotes are often solitary hunters but also pack up for hunting bigger game and they are precision pack hunters that can bring down much bigger game than you would expect due to the precision and perfectly coordinated attacks. Where did they come from after disappearing for a 100 years ?? Damned if I know.

[firebird74521]

A previous post mentioned donkeys!! In western Canada many farmers with sheep have bought Donkeys because for some strange reason, Donkeys have a natural hatred of Coyotes and attack them on site. Strange but true. Donkeys are the watch dogs for the sheep.

[shortwave]

I believe Llama's are also a natural hater of yotes and are used by many farmers to protect their livestock.

[rickyrick]

Llamas will sometimes open a can of whoop @** on humans and pets for no apparent reason. So I steer clear of llamas.

[ltc444]

Contributed to protecting the Antelope population in Apache County today.

Popped a Coyote at 75 yds with my wifes 9mm. Am going to start carrying a long gun in the PU. Miss my rifle rack of yesterday.