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Added July 19, 2008:
Join Eastern Coyote Research in recommending a National Canid Protection Act (click here to learn more )
Coyotes are social, family-oriented animals much like wolves are. However, they have been very successful because they can breed at a young age, use smaller areas than larger carnivores, generally eat smaller food items like rodents and rabbits rather than deer and elk, and have high reproductive rates. Mostly for these reasons, and the occasional legitimate trouble that they cause, the majority of states sadly allow unlimited killing of them (often referred to as pests).
However, Eastern Coyote Research has a different vision. ECR has hope that people will read Suburban Howls and will come to value living with these carnivores, even in their backyards. ECR has hope that the coyote’s social, family-oriented behavior will be seen as important in preserving, and even if they can survive unlimited hunting and trapping, that it is not worth it, considering the pain and suffering many go through during this process.
Accordingly, the following suggestions will make coyote management more equitable. ECR urges you to pressure your state (or federal) officials to adopt these same measures:
1. Shorten the hunting season to a couple of months maximum during the winter. A social and behaviorally sophisticated animal like the coyote should not be pressured all year long, unless they are causing damage on private land. At least their pelts are valuable during the winter.
2. Baiting coyotes should be illegal. The same was done with bear and bobcat back in 1996 in Massachusetts. Most people and many hunters do not like the thought of shooting an animal with its head buried in bait.
3. Establish a bag limit per hunter. If hunters want to kill a coyote they should have to pay for it just like they do with animals such as bears and cougars. They should have to buy a special tag for $5 or $10 and they should only be allowed 1-2 per state just like they are with most wild animals. Although a relatively arbitrary number, it does amount to a mated group of coyotes, certainly a significant number for a local area. This ensures that the majority of people still get to enjoy seeing and hearing coyotes
4. Hounding (the use of dogs) should also be illegal. Chasing another predator to exhaustion is an archaic and unnecessary means to kill an animal.
5. Make poison illegal. Household rat poisons kill many non-target animals in addition to predators like coyotes. It should be more difficult to obtain things such as d-Con, which is a powerful poison. These poisons cause an animal to bleed to death internally.
6. Non-lethal alternatives first. The centuries-old law (in many states including MA) that allows anyone to kill a predator near their livestock should be changed to a statute that is more balanced and in keeping with current times. Prevention should be mandated over killing. Proper husbandry techniques should be mandatory for livestock owners.
7. None of these strategies and laws will be effective, however, unless education is at the core of the mission for eastern coyote conservation.
· Pamphlets and brochures, along with scientific documents, need to reach diverse audiences.
· Private and state organizations need to use the latest scientific findings to communicate coyote ecology and behavior, and their place in all environments, ranging from rural to urban.
· Money needs to be set aside to accomplish these goals.
8. Stop state and federal funding of predator control. Did you know that we, the tax-payers (through the Federal Government's division called "Wildlife Services"), pay for over 80,000 coyotes (and lots of other wildlife) to be killed every year to support private livestock raisers, often on our public lands? Did you know that about 30,000 coyotes are killed aerial every year in the United States (this means that a plane with a sharp shooter on-board literally fires bullets into coyotes)? Did you know that we often spend more money killing wildlife (especially coyotes) than the actual damage that they cause. Get rid of these cruel, pathetic, and unnecessary practices.
9. Ban the commercial sale of coyote and other furbearing animals' pelts. Market hunting for meat for species like deer was banned in the early 1900's yet somehow it was not for furbearers. Wildlife is supposed to belong to everyone yet a minority get to profit from them by killing unlimited numbers of many of these species and selling them. While fur is now unpopular and mostly unfashionable, the industry is unfortunately entrenched in state fish and wildlife management policies and it will almost certainly take a federal act/law to ban the commercial sale of all wild animals. But it should be done. We don't need to survive by using other animal's skins and it is now mostly a recreational activity.
10. Uniqueness of coyotes. A final recommendation is a plea to everyone, to you the reader, to recognize the importance of this magnificent predator in a multitude of ecosystems where the coyote ranges, from southern Central America to the northern reaches of North America. Respect the animal for what it is; before you take any potential control actions on it, first think if you would do the same thing to your dog.
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