Coyotes

[ahockenberry]

I have noticed more than one coyote image being posted here and it just so happened that I saw 2 on my way into work this morning. I did not get any shots as I did not have my camera handy, but will bring it with me tomorrow, but these guys seem to be more plentiful everywhere. I did pull over and watch them for a minute or so. They did not seem to be bothered by me in the least although they did notice me.

I got this information off the web, which I thought was very interesting:

"Coyotes and wolves can interbreed and produce fertile offspring. In fact all members of the genus Canis (dogs, wolves, coyotes and jackals) are interfertile. However, in the wild they generally do not interbreed, as wolves often treat coyotes as though they were unwanted competition because they often chase or kill any coyotes they come across. However, when dispersers (wolves that leave their packs and live as lone wolves) fail to find another wolf to mate with, they may turn to breeding with coyotes. For example, it was suspected that a small race of wolves found around Lake Superior and Lake Huron were actually coyote-wolf mixes. This suspicion arose after George Kolenosky, of the Ontario Fish and Wildlife branch, reported that a captive Algonquin park wolf had successfully mated and raised young with a captive coyote in 1971. The offspring were fertile. In 1992, it was confirmed, by a study conducted by Dr. Robert Wayne (University of California of Los Angeles) that coyotes and wolves around Lake Superior were occasionally interbreeding. That conclusion came from genetic tests that showed that some of the wolves possessed coyote mitochondrial DNA sequences. There are also no doubts that red wolves (Canis rufus) and coyotes have hybridized. Red wolves are very rare in the wild and have been stressed by habitat loss, and often are not able to find con-specific mates. So far, all documented coyote-wolf matings have involved male wolves and female coyotes. Coyotes and dogs will occasionally interbreed to produce animals generally referred to as "coydogs," though such matings are somewhat rare."

[EV Wonder]

Interesting read on the coyotes. I've seen a few this year, once with a camera, but they were off in the distance and I couldn't get a decent shot.

Even more interesting, I think, is the recent sightings of a cougar in the Strathroy area (reported only today in the London Free Press). Many may doubt this, and I might have too, but I had a sighting myself around 7 years ago, north of Whitby. Many people thought that I may have had an early drink that day, but were more readily convinced when they discovered that three of the friends that were with me also saw it.

Initially we thought that it might have escaped from the Metropolitan Toronto Zoo, just west of the Rouge River Valley. We reported it to the authorities and an article appeared in the local paper. I thought that was pretty cool...though I was glad I didn't end up on the breakfast menu!! :biggrin:

[Keith]

they are every where around here rolleyes; always on the move

[Wulff]

I think this why Coyotes are so successful.
Somehow they manage to fly under the radar with phenominal results.

Ashely.
Despite being hard to find/see in Urban area like Toronto they are in fact quite numerous. I tihnk in recent years sighting are becoming more common but tI think that more due to human encroachment, than coyote population numbers. They are pretty reclusive and it would be easy to coimpletely overlook them. There are (or were) packs in Mt Pleasant Cemetary, Don river valley, Leslie Street spit etc that few were aware of despite being in the heart of TO.

Anyways, long winded way of saying theyve always been around, and likekly in great numbers, we just havent noticed them much. The development of our region (from Ajax to Bowmanville) in recent years has exploded and as such, has taken huge tracts of both farm land and brush/forest from animals. That more than anything is likely why people are seeing them more and more often.

Coyotes, kind of like Red Tails are pretty adaptive to Urban settings, and likely will fare better than the deer etc that are being displaced as a result of all this development going on around us.