Coexist. A concept we should all be familiar with whilst living in a wild multi-species world. Even those living in the most urbanized and industrial of habitats are, in one form or another, currently coexisting with a plethora of wildlife. From small insects, commensal rodents and countless bird species, to deer, skunks, and even bears; we’re all - to some degree or another - living with wildlife.
Take the third-largest American city of Chicago, for example, which has been reminded of this notion quite often in recent months. Whether it’s reports in an abundance of sick raccoons, or the most recent headlines of multiple coyote attacks on people last month - the presence of the natural world in an otherwise industrial mecca is hard to ignore.
In one of those recent coyote attacks, a passerby wrestled a coyote off of a 6-year-old boy who was bitten in the head. By week’s end, one animal suspected to be involved in the attacks was captured on the city’s North Side. The Chicago Tribune reports that the coyote “taken into custody” over the attack on that 6-year-old has been positively confirmed as the “perpetrator” via DNA testing.
The most recent attacks come just months after security video captured a coyote attacking a child in broad daylight as she played in her yard in Villa Park, a village within the Chicago metropolitan area.
What’s more fascinating than Chicago’s increasing coyote conflict is what officials are actually doing with the wild “offenders” of such incidents.
Rather than being euthanized, the coyote captured and confirmed in the attack has been sentenced to jail time. The (previously) wild animal, which has now been given the name “Mercy”, will serve hard time in a “permanent educational setting with specifics yet to be determined” according to reports.
While the notion of a wild animal doing wild animal things shouldn’t come as an egregious shock; the news of a wild animal (which was confirmed aggressive towards humans) spending the rest of its lifespan in the proverbial drunk tank was not the outcome many had expected, to say the least.
Just as news of the Chicago coyote’s sentence was sweeping the web, reports rushed in from 900 miles east, where a New Hampshire man strangled a (now confirmed) rabid coyote to death after the animal attacked his two-year-old son while hiking. Two other coyote attacks were reported in nearby NH towns the same morning, including a woman who was attacked along with one of her dogs, and a report of a coyote attacking a vehicle. More reports continued to come in from other communities of strange acting coyotes - during the transportation of the dead coyote’s carcass - suggesting more than one overly-aggressive animal was in the area. Again, shock is limited, as one can draw your own conclusions as to the healthy abundance of coyotes in the Northeast United States.
This recent string of human-involved attacks are thrust into the forefront amid a societal interest in coyote conflict from coast to coast. According to coyote watchdog groups, thirty-eight (38) coyote attacks on humans were reported in the mainstream media in 2019 across Canada and the United States (Five (5) of which involved children). This was a similar trend to the forty (40) in 2018.
Hardly an epidemic - but noteworthy nonetheless.
Only six (6) coyotes involved in those 38 attacks last year were confirmed rabid. None of the reported attacks ended in a human fatality.
Of the U.S. attacks, the majority took place in the Northeast US - where debate over the management of abundant predators, such as coyotes, wages on in almost every state.
Adaptability
With ongoing habitat loss a prime concern, wildlife conflict is expected to continue. Based on current trends, society seems to be practicing less in the form of coexistence, and more in the way of asynchronism.
While the idea of wildlife coexistence is nothing new, the concept as a buzzword has taken the forefront in environmentalist and animal rights activism circles - with supporters trying to drive home the notion of “coexistence” as an alternative to lethal measures. Regulated hunting activities focused around predators such as coyotes tend to bear the brunt of criticism from these circles, with protests and political push to restrict coyote hunting across North America boiling at an all-time high.
A coyote saunters through a California parking lot.
Meanwhile, frustrated rural land owners and urban citizens alike aren’t shy about their willful scorn for the emboldened coyote; whether attacks are carried out on house pets, livestock, or simply a case of the animal being spotted in the wrong place at the wrong time.
This dichotomy of differing levels with regard for the coyote further polarizes the debate. There’s a lot of people who truly love coyotes, and a lot of people who truly hate ‘em. This makes for quite the balancing act for impartial wildlife professionals when the topics of management, regulated cull, and public safety-driven pest control begin to swirl in the same social cauldron.
And while the debate rages on, camps on either end of the “coyote coexistence” spectrum are locked in a tug-o-war over the future management of the abundant wild canine.
The charismatic coyote is increasingly sucked into the “hands-off” vacuum of protectionism; a variant of conservation that completely omits human intervention in the boom and bust cycles of nature’s inhabitants. Demands for a preservationist-fueled coexistence model intensifies with every coyote conflict headline making the nightly news. And boy, do coyotes make the news.
The narrative is typically similar; coyote causes conflict, and inevitably someone is interviewed to assert the cause is humans, with little credence given to adaptable predators simply being predators, and a lack of suggestive constructive aversion technique to avoid another conflict from happening again.
The reality - there are often times where lethal measures either aren’t feasible or clearly not warranted for a coyote “issue”. However, there’s growing doubt amongst many citizens over the one-size-fits-all “hands-off” notion of coexistence as a solely passive measure hailed as the rubber-stamp resolution.
Moreover, the coyote as a furbearer, is prized as a cherished resource by the natural fur industry for its insulating hide. While some activists relish in the notion of demonizing the coyote hunter and fur trapper (which are both regulated by state wildlife agencies), as a burden on the natural world; those same activists seem to negate the glaring trend of driving the coyote from one marketable commodity to another - pest control.
According to their own reports, USDA Wildlife Services, a government agency tasked with mitigating specific wildlife-related conflict issues, killed over 68,000 coyotes in 2018 over nuisance/damage complaints - much to the ire of animal rights organizations.
Many of which try desperately to lump civilian hunters and trappers in with the reactive mitigation activities of USDA’s Wildlife Services as an all encompassing unnecessary evil. Coincidentally omitted more often than not, is the fact that one variant of coyote cull thrives in the absence of the other.
Irony persists even in the face of saving animals from other animals. While activist groups continually threaten lawsuit after lawsuit to keep species like bears and wolves on the Endangered Species List, the same like-minded protectionists hurl public outrage over attempts to manage other legitimately threatened species - such as the recent case over coyote depredation on vulnerable endangered sea turtles in North Carolina.
The Human Psyche of Coexistence
Many are also beginning to question whether those beating the “coexistence” drum the loudest truly know what the word actually means; and more importantly, how its applied to human civilization amidst an ever-changing habitat for wildlife.
Merriam-Webster defines coexistence as:
to exist together or at the same time
to live in peace with each other especially as a matter of policy
Since its pretty well understood that non-human wildlife species such as coyotes and wolves lack the capacity to understand concepts such as “peace” and “policy” as described in definition #2, it would appear safe for one to assert that definition #1 best relates to our furry neighbors.
We exist. Together. In the same place and at the same time.
It sounds simple, a concept that neither accepts a “kill them all” mantra, nor allows for us to threaten our own existence for the other willingly. We manage their populations when we need to, and push for non-lethal alternatives when applicable - or so we did.
So what happens when lethal control simply isn’t a feasible option?
“Out in the wild in rural areas if a coyote gets bold and hangs around people, it’s going to get shot,” says Roland Kays, an ecologist at North Carolina State University and the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences. “In urban areas that just doesn’t happen.” he added.
Finding ways to make coyotes fear humans again is “tricky,” he told the New York Times during a 2018 article reporting on coyote conflict woes in cities like Denver and Quebec.
While both sides of the predator management debate (mostly) agree that species like coyotes are adapting to human life, and full extermination isn’t the answer, there is still heavy debate that “non-lethal harmony” is the end all/be all.
It would appear as though even the animal rights industry recognizes the idea of a non-human-influenced utopia for canid predators may be unrealistic. Recent research has found that hazing and non-lethal tactics are only temporary, and that lethal control, in a regulated sense, is still a viable management option.
Even those who assert the fallacy that regulated hunting somehow only “breeds more coyotes” have recently backpedaled these notions, conceding that coyote reproduction is directly linked to food abundance rather than “magical genitalia” churning out denser litters to “compensate” for hunting pressure.
The Narragansett Bay Coyote Study, a five year program which studies coyotes in urban areas of Rhode Island found that “limiting food subsidies will reduce coyote numbers, along with coyote traffic, habituation, and human-wildlife interactions”.
The big trending question is, does the majority of society actually want to reduce human-wildlife interactions? Or are the masses more interested in the idea of a “coyote selfie” with ol’ Wily E sunbathing on the back deck in urban America?
Whether or not predator hunting goes the way of the social dustbin, the reality remains there is no shortage of food abundance for a species that has adapted well by feeding on small rodents, deer, acorns, fruit, trash, birdseed, dumpster remnants, and, in many cases, each-other. Despite division in the details of management research, most seem to agree that populations of coyotes will thrive regardless of hazing -or- hunting due to this mixed food abundance.
With regard to the intricacies of humans and coyotes specifically, neither species appears to be slowing down, population-wise - meaning coexistence has been, and will continue to be inevitable.
However, one species has the capacity to administer rational thought, while the other survives purely on primal instinct. Just as one can assert that the “kill ‘em all” mentality is not the answer for wild predators, neither is the irrational and reckless notion that we will all live in harmony with our fellow wild residents.
Regardless, we are at an interesting crossroads in our coexistence with large mammalian predators. Recent headlines and social media posts paint the ongoing narrative of this ever changing duality in real time. From the recent coyote attacks in Chicago and subsequent handling of the aggressor, to canine distemper and rabies outbreaks in major cities from coast to coast, to the heated debates over the reintroduction of wolves and de-listing of grizzly bears. We must ponder whether our human society (all humans, rural, urban, hunter, or non-hunter) have reached an unavoidable pinnacle in our capacity to actually (and willingly) manage wildlife.
So if the narrative is that coyote conflict is always human induced, as many seem to contend, what would be considered the right course of conflict reduction? Surely, the notion that one must just throw up one’s hands and “coexist” with increasingly aggressive coyote behavior is in need of further elaboration. While animal rights groups sink an immeasurable mass of funding into banning and stopping regulated predator hunting, predator management, and predator control (both private and Government oriented), very little (by comparison) seems to be invested in ensuring society follows through with the real coyote conflict control methods - keeping the trash cans closed, the pets confined, and the wild habitat preserved.
The coexistence car continues to careen down the conservation freeway - seat-belted inside are licensed hunters, contract trappers, animal protectionists, biologists, and indifferent citizens. Its becoming harder and harder to decipher who’s steering, and more importantly, where said car will crash amid the occupants constantly vying for control of the wheel.
Today, many want the idea of conservation to be about preserving the individual rather than the species as a whole. While conservation ethos focus primarily on the take and commoditization of wildlife, the notion of a world where all animals are stockpiled (or in this case, sentenced to animal jail), has the potential to threaten both their existence as well as our own.
(Photos | National Parks Service)
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