We have had a good size pack (from the sound) of Coyotes living in our gully here in the Finger Lakes for several years now. They have lots of cover and plenty of rodents/ rabbits to feast on, their primary diet. I have sheep and a horse and electric net fencing, so no trouble so far. The neighbor who has a good size flock of sheep had a sheep guard dog in with the flock. No reports of coyote attacks on any of the local flocks. We do have barn cats disappear, but they do wander into the woods, so possibly cross tracks with the pack. But then we also have raccoon and fox, so maybe they are responsible. The strange thing is that the Coyotes seem to have disappeared this winter. We know there IS rabies in the area - my husband got bitten by a confirmed rabid skunk in Feb., so I am wondering if the pack was taken sick and died out. With the number of rodents and rabbits they eat, they are welcome to live in my gully, and since it is good habitat, I assume they will be back. On another note, I have had Owls living in my woods in the gully since I have lived here - 32 years - but I did not hear a single Owl this winter. I leave old and dying trees in the gully to encourage their nesting, so I know they have shelter, and am wondering what could have happened to them also. -Rosalinda

Coyote ... "red phase" They range from pale cream to reddish brown like this one through the usual grey-brown and on into a silver-black coloring. For some reason, perhaps crossing with the eastern wolves, East coast coyotes seem to have more color variety. He doesn't look unusually husky to me, for a summer coyote. It's the fluffy fur in winter that makes their legs look so skinny.

I saw the post heading but did not look at the date. We too live in Canada - Toronto - and last Friday received a 4 page flyer from Animal Control re the increasing population of Coyotes in Toronto - and near our house - a few blocks away there is a big park, but the coyotes are becoming increasing brave and venturing further afield in search of food - and people have been feeding the coyote "puppies". They are competing with raccoons and skunks - they are of course a nuisance but a far cry from a raccoon. Re the OP's question re a Coyote jumping a 6 ft. fence - most definitely. Heck our 22 lb. dog can jump a 5 ft. from a standing position. I called Animal Control and was told to be careful, particularly in the early a.m. and evening - of course it is dark - and to never put our dog in the yard alone - we don't do this anyway. And to always have him on a leash - which he is. But dogs are being attacked by Coyotes while on leash, including a Chocolate Lab, not that far from here. His Mom beat off the 2 Coyotes who were biting him and then they came back for more - Mom and dog got away thankfully. In one area not far from us, Coyotes have been seen looking in windows checking for dogs and cats. Suggested deterrents are coins in a can (useless - they don't even scare my dog) - or small air horns - I got the last one at Sport Chek much to the dismay of other shoppers. I know the noise will hurt our guy's ears, but better that than the alternative. People are being told to take down bird feeders since Coyotes will search them out - I feel sorry for the birds who will return each year for food, but.... The Coyotes of course are looking for food since so much of their native habitat is now covered with houses. This problem will get worse - and a child has been bitten by a Coyote in the GTA. I for one would be eaten I guess by a Coyote while trying to save our dog. My friend owns a store in Toronto and was written up in the local area newspaper. On the adjoining page there was an article about the increase of Coyotes in Toronto and how to deal with the problem. Quite a large write-up. I did a Coyote search on our dog's specific breed forum and many people in the U.S. are facing the same issue but many states allow people to protect themselves in ways that Canadian laws do not - so an air horn it is - as well as having a fit during the early morning and night walks when we hear a noise or rustling in the bushes! Animal Control suggested speaking with neighbours to best devise ways to deal with garbage and keep pets safe - so far - zip. Cats are still being let out to run loose - and some people feel that since the major park isn't right across the street (well there is a park across the street - just a different one) that they need not worry. The usual case of "it couldn't happen to me". There are a couple of people though who are worried, thankfully.

Jay, I just do not understand why the coyotes seem to be losing their fear of humans lately, but it is obvious they have. I miss the good old days when they turned tail and slunk away like the varmints they are. Maybe too many are breeding with feral dogs and too many dog genes are wiping out their fear of human beings. I am glad that the one Judy's daughter saw didn't come after her. I know it is very rare for them to attack people, but occasionally one does. I have read about the fairly new hybrid Coywolves but aren't we all too far away from wolf habitat to have them here? I am fairly sure we are down here at my end of the state. Since you're so close to Colorado, I could see Coywolves maybe being more likely there. For those of you who haven't seen anything about Coywolves before, here's some info on them: CoyWolf We are seeing the same recklessness on the part of bobcats, but since they are smaller, they don't scare me as much. That doesn't mean I want to get too close to one. I also think we are seeing them out more in daylight, year-round, and it doesn't seem to matter if it is a dry year or a wet year, so I'm thinking they are not necessarily being driven to hunt in the daylight hours because food is scarce. I don't know if coyotes and bobcats feed on foxes, but I assume they do. We see tons ot coyotes and bobcats now and almost never see a fox. I miss seeing the darling little red foxes and gray foxes running up the road. (I wouldn't feel that way if one was trying to grab a small chicken, like a banty of a half-grown standard chicken.) And, one more thing. Ever since the flooding of 2015, we almost never see raccoons in our yard. Before that, we had them all over. We aren't seeing many possums or armadillos either. At first I attributed this to the flooding, and figured it merely swept away a lot of them. Maybe it did, but maybe it didn't. Maybe the predators are eating them. Carol, That's always a possibility. In the bad cougar year, my hands shook so much after an encounter that I had a hard time opening the door. It wasn't even locked, I don't think. It was just that my hands were shaking so much I couldn't turn the door knob. I tried to call Tim and had a hard time operating the cell phone, and it didn't matter because he was in one room with the door closed and his phone was 3 rooms away. (This caused a loud disagreement because I already had told him over and over to keep his phone near him because I was having so may wildlife scares.) The time a skunk chased me from the back garden area to the house was almost as scary. It wasn't that I thought the skunk would kill me, but I feared he'd catch up with me and bite me and then I'd have to have rabies shots. Reading what I just wrote has me thinking I have lost my mind and should just move back to the city. What in the world are all these wild things doing in my life????? We have so much more wildlife now than we had when we moved here. That's not right. They should be afraid of us and should be vacating our property to avoid close human contact, and they certainly aren't doing that. Dawn