The NYC Parks Department put some trained hawks in Bryant Park to deal with the local subway rats, until one of them decided to snack on a local chihuahua.
The coyotes are thick as locusts here in Arizona. A couple of my neighbors were walking their two dogs, leashed, and a coyote approached them and attacked their dogs. Fortunately, they were able to drive the coyote off and the dogs escaped without any serious injuries. But the coyotes here have no fear of people and consider dogs invaders in their territories. Luckily it was a single coyote in the instance.
Yup, as I mentioned, it happens often. Unfortunately, many newcomers to AZ have no idea coyotes can even show up in the middle of metro Phoenix. We are in the northern Valley foothills, and they walk by our house almost every day. Our neighbors have a six-foot high wall, and we’ve seem them jump to the top of that, which amazes me.
We also have bobcats come by all the time, looking in the windows at us, but I have never heard of one attacking a dog of any size. Very few people are foolish enough to let their cats out, but I never heard of a bobcat taking a domestic cat ether. Have you, cochrane?
I’ve lived in the Northeast (PA, NY, and ME) for years, and also in the Southwest (Southern CA) for years, and IME the Northeast has far more small game available than the Southwest. So I’d imagine the coyotes there are a bit less desperate for a meal.
Not here. Yotes are too smart to fight midsize dogs without a very good reason.
I’ve seen yotes look at my outside cats from a distance, but the cats are smart enough to sense trouble and head for a barn.
And whatever is less dangerous. Fellow carnivores tend to be more dangerous. Of course a fat lap dog with bad teeth isn’t that dangerous.
OTOH, note that dogs go missing all the time even without coyotes- they get lost, run away, get run over or 'adopted". Or they could annoy a larger herbivore and get kicked to death.
I believe you are misunderstanding me, Mr. Rolleyes. The question was how to account for the supposed aggressiveness of western coyotes towards dogs, compared with their larger eastern kin. It was suggested that the answer was that there is less food in the west. My point was, how could this exist as anything but a temporary phenomenon? Sure, a temporary shortage of prey will lead to coyotes seeking ANYTHING to make up for it… but a longer term shortage will inevitably lead to less coyotes, and there goes the explanation for increased aggression.
Here is a cite:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/28/science/28coyotes.html?emc=eta1
There are coyotes in the park near my house where I walk my dogs. Once we came upon a german shepherd that was torn apart. It was not a pretty sight.
I haven’t heard of healthy bobcats taking pet cats. But old and infirm bobcats sometimes will hunt them. And I have heard of rabid bobcats attacking people in mid-Tucson. If they’re rabid, all bets are off.
That’s Mrs. Rolleyes to you.
Interesting link, though. Essentially, they’re saying there are (almost?) no pure-bred coyotes, at least in the Northeast, is that right? They’re all hybrids to one extent or another?
Where do you live? Also, are you sure it couldn’t have been scavenged after being hit by a car? How desperate would coyotes have to be to go after a dog like that? Sure they could overwhelm it with numbers, but some of them are bound to get fucked up in the process.
Here in Rhode Island there are numerous anecdotes of cats and dogs taken by coyotes. Since the coyotes are mainly nocturnal its hard to verify. But animal control tells me as the number of coyote carcasses found on the highway increases, the number of cat and dog carcasses decreases. Still anecdotal though.
When we first moved here there was a large feral cat population. Soon after coyote sightings increased, and feral cats almost disappeared. After the coyote population dwindled, the deer population increased. The population changes might be linked to predation, or just the side effect of ongoing home construction changing the environment.
Well, the first could mean coyotes are eating roadkill, something which is doubtless.
The 2nd could mean the coyotes are outcompeting the feral cats in their niche. Again, quite possible, coyotes are very good at scavaging for food.
Of course, no one doubts that an occasional hungry coyote will kill and eat a cat. The question is- is it a large number or a just a few?
The question will remain as long as only anecdotal evidence is available. Maybe they’ll find the elephant graveyard someday, or some baby pigeons.
I think the answer is somewhere in between. Combine competition and predation with the usual number of missing pets that are assumed to have run away or died on the road when coyotes aren’t available to blame. Then add in the number that go to that farm in the country.
I don’t know how that question could ever be answered, short of some researchers tracking a coyote group and analyzing their scat. Too many feral cats to account for.
I am a block from Hines Drive in Dearborn. I have seen coyotes many times. When I worked in a Dearborn office a few years ago, every morning a family of coyotes walked down the railroad tracks at 6:30.
The shepard was not near the road.
I saw a couple coyotes in broad daylight 2 years ago when 4 turkeys were running around Hines. Every few days ,there was 1 less turkey. I saw the coyotes sneaking up on them through the bushes.
When coyotes move in, rabbits, squirrels and groundhogs disappear . My beagles love to chase squirrels and rabbits. I know when they are gone from an area.
An old dog in our town in Massachusetts was killed by coyotes a few years ago.
I’ve never known a coyote to kill a dog. It may be professional courtesy.
But they don’t seem to like each other very much.
One thing some are forgetting is that a dog in the wild may be weak from hunger not knowing how to fend for itself. If it’s famished and weak it will be be far easier to take down that the perky dog that well fed and watered.