Our hunting property is lousy with the damn things. When I'm down there and not bowhunting I've always got a gun close by. I kill every one of them I get a chance to.

What are "coyote problems"? We adjacent to the Balcones Canyonlands so we have no shortage of them. But the population doesn't seem to have increased and we haven't had any unusual encounters with them.

They've just been doing what coyotes do.

Same here. Doesn't seem to be any more or less. They have their place. I have no problem with them.

Trappers can be your friend.

Yep.

Looks like a group of this years pups running together. Another couple months and most of 'em will separate and head off on their own, hopefully.

Thoot him!

Yeah, it's calving season here and there's always problems.

We have a property we hunt in Illinois that seems to be loaded with them. This past year we put cell cameras out, and although we get some good deer pictures we also get a ton of coyotes on camera-- more than we ever knew were there. They need thinned out for sure.

like Mike B said - pups.

I have a buddy that traps 40+ a year. Good for deer!!! Me? I am having bear problems. First sit this year, Ma and 3 cubs. At one point all 3 cubs in the trees around me at 5 yards. Damn things, came in 10 min before closing and getting dark fast.

I think the local bears have eaten them all...

I have lived in Nevada, Colorado and 2 years in Montana. It's amazing how the western U.S. is and has been loaded with Coyotes forever and they don't realize what a "problem" they have with them.

We took 8 of them off of our farm last year. They just keep filling in. Don't think we'll ever be rid of them.

It's normal they are very adaptive

Yes, big time !

There is a pack of 20-25, maybe more right here in the area where I live. They are trapped, shot and stomped by wild burros at every opportunity but their numbers have remained pretty stable over time. People keep your dogs up and one thing you don't see around here is cats.

Less trappers these days with fur market in the tank. Doesn't take long for them to overrun an area if left unchecked.

I hear them around but haven’t seen any. Don’t know if they stay away since I have two big 115lb Great Pyrenees that roam the property.

It's just a fact of life in our area, and always has been.

Hogs too, and they are worse than the coyotes.

You leave a downed deer overnight, and you're very likely only going to find some scattered parts when you find it.

Rick

We seem to have plenty but not any more than usual. We also have a good fawn crop this year, and chipmunks are everywhere, ain't that just amazing. :) We hear coyotes almost every night out here where I live.

“We took 8 of them off of our farm last year. They just keep filling in. Don't think we'll ever be rid of them.”

Well, there’s your problem.

Larry Sez…. If you have a resident pair of coyotes which are content to live off of vermin, then leave them alone and they will keep more troublesome individuals out of their territory. It’s a live and let live solution in which you have a little bit of say regarding which ones you choose to live with.

And while I agree that hunters and coyotes have gotten along well enough for a very long time out west, out there (at least outside of the suburbs) they pretty much get shot at every time they show themselves, and they don’t have anywhere near the smorgasbord of Roadkill that there is once you go further east. And once coyotes have large easily defended food sources (such as Road kills) then their behavior goes from tending to live as pairs to tending to run in packs, and it becomes really a whole new dynamic.

It’s all part of their amazing adaptability.

And it might be worth mentioning that out west, there are a lot more mountain lions available to keep the coyote numbers in check. Same is true where there are wolves.

What Rick said. If you hit a deer late, you better have or get a light, cause it won't be on the ground long. Allot of missing dog signs up in the neighborhoods, ????

Our community (Sun City, AZ) has 5 golf courses. We have yotes everywhere. Lots of rabbits, Quail, Doves, to feed themselves. Also they like small dogs, will come up behind you and grab the dog leash and all. No, no cats, at least outside. They can also make resistance in the yards of the “snow dodgers”. No one bothers them. People here are more worried about Rattlesnakes and Scorpions than yotes.

Folks around here are wising up and keeping wild burros and pissed off mules in with their cow-calf herds. A bad donkey is pretty rough on song dogs, they're also a bitch to tube worm.

In East Texas I don't hear of them bothering calves. In West Texas sheep & goat country I have never heard one. If there is one reported the trappers get right after it. I mostly consider them a hunting opportunity. If anything gets overpopulated it can be a problem. >>>----> Ken

Yotes here will cross-breed with the Red Wolves east of Raliegh and then spread back west, which results in a larger heavier built Yote with a reddish tint to the guard hairs. The bigger cross-breeds are more of a threat to deer and newborn calf sized prey. I live in the North Central North Carolina Piedmont, and they have made it back this far from Down-East.

They're a plague and they need to be shot on sight.

I don't mind the species per se, but they're population is out of control just like city geese and iguanas down in south Florida.

Bunch of youngsters

I do not believe significant depredation of cattle/calves exists.As a Vet for almost 37 years I think they scavenge dead calves or down cows and get blamed for everything.I begrudgingly have to admire they're ability to survive.

When the PA Game Commission finally admitted we had coyotes, and not coy-dogs, I had a wildlife biologist friend tell me, "The last human on earth, at his passing, will hear coyotes howling."

He said if they were overhunted, the natural order of things would just create larger litters for a few years to compensate; under- hunted, or lack of food, the litters will just be smaller.

Try as we might, we hunters will never wipe them out.

Only when I wear team Fitzgerald dear dander. Last 10 years I've seen more coyotes than I ever have. I haven't killed one since I've been wearing it. I'm going to start carrying a sidearm. One year as overrun. They were hunting me I think. Let them hear a little shot and taste some lead. JF

I recorded a video of a coyote hunting mice in a pasture with cows, calves, a doe and a her fawn. The doe snorted at the coyote about 60 yards away, he looked at her and the fawn, then went back to mousing. When the coyote left, it walked right between/among the cows, just a couple of feet from them, and not one of them even lifted its head from grazing to acknowledge its presence.

What I don't care for is demonizing coyotes 'because they kill all MY deer'... while I'm sitting in here bs'n on the internet :^P

"their"

My cameras have been between 10,200' and 11,600'. Picked up elk, deer, moose and bear. Not a single yote.

It's pretty hard to have Coydogs without Coyotes. lol

The majority of the US.

For once, someone cares about their grammar.

Coyotes and cockroaches....it's been said they will be the last to survive any catastrophe on earth that happens.

Coyotes have always been in the areas that I've lived and hunted. They cycle with the available food source...lotsa rabbits?, more coyote pups per litter..rabbit population down?, less coyotes. IDNR releasing pen raised "wild turkeys" otherwise known as dumb birds'? easy meals for the coyotes, and me too :))

Had so many they woke me up at about 2:30 in the AM. Right behind the house I heard a hell of a noise with them. Wintertime, snow on the ground, I went out onto the back porch to see WTH! I could see the outlines of at least a dozen yotes against the snow...as close as 15 yards from my back porch. What I figured was it was two different packs having one hell of a fight...my labs were barking and with me even standing there they didn't spook and run off. ...not til I went and grabbed the shotgun and got off a few shots at the closest ones. Found splatters of blood only, shotgun was loaded with bird shot...bought some double ought after!

I had heard of coyotes fighting another pack imposing on their territory...got to witness it that early morning.

I don't hate coyotes, I've arrowed a few...(missed many) and won't pass on them given a good shot. They've took two of our barn cats. They're here to stay no doubt. Just heard their yipping and and howling last night...went on for several minutes.

Song dogs...cool with me.

"their"

If that was directed at me nolz I am fully aware that I made the mistake, but you can't edit on this 1992 format site lol.

I'm a college graduate too, with two degrees.

What cracks me up are all of the people who seem to believe that if a coyote population is heavily hunted, they will “respond” by deliberately having larger litters, as if to say “oh yeah? Shoot all you want, we’ll make more! Up your’s!!”

They will birth exactly as many as the female’s body can support, every year.

If it were remotely bad to exterminate coyotes, they would all be dead by now. But it’s not. The coyote population is always going to be exactly what the land can support, give or take a couple.

Around here, they probably don’t have to kill that many to eat well, simply because so many get hit on the roadways. But then, that rich diet probably is conducive to very large litters. So yeah, where deer are thick and roads/cars are many, coyotes are thick as can be.

One more reason to hunt close and shoot straight.

Whoops, I see you made the mistake too. LOL

At 4nolz: I agree that coyotes get blamed for killing livestock they had no part of. On a 1700 acre mostly wooded land I hunted where a farmer/rancher had a about 40 head of cattle, I came across two dead calves two years apart. Spring scouting. One was most likely stillborn, it was fresh, a day or two at the most with the cow nowhere hanging around. Coyotes scavenged. The other was definitely born alive and was taken down by 3-4 coyotes by my count of the tracks left. How do I know? That calf was already strong enough to try and run from them...calf and mamas cows tracks were all dug in the soft soil. Mama cow was there nearby wailing to me when I came up on the scene.

On that same property I found the skeleton remains of several fawns every year I hunted/scouted it for more than a dozen years. The coyotes were abundant, I heard them most every night as I left after an evenings hunt.

For a better understanding of coyote evolution, migration, and adaptation after many attempts to exterminate them check out the book "Coyote America".

At Jeff Durnell: I, of course can't tell you how those fawns met their death that I found with any certainty ..but my experience with having spent decades of time hunting the seasons and also as much time as I could off season in the woods, I've come to certain conclusions that I feel fairly confident in.

Coyotes are hell on newborn fawns where there is a good population of fawns and abundant coyotes. My son witnessed, alerted by his wife planting their garden, a coyote, being chased by mama doe, her baby fawn in the coyotes jaws bawling. My son went for his gun but wasn't in time... the coyote had dropped the fawn at one point maybe due to my son's wife screaming but grabbed the fawn back up again and disappeared into the woods. Mama doe didn't seem to pursue after...she was probably too weak. A very sad to thing to see.

My grandkids witnessed this also, very upsetting to them...a lesson in what nature is.

I pretty much wasted six years of school with zero student debt at Georgia back in the mid 70's to early 80's when I could have just tuned in here to learn everything about everything. What a waste, I could have been off fishing.

We used to not have a problem. Then they started having the big bobcat contests with big money prizes. In order to win, you have to have the largest bobcat and a certain number of coyote qualifiers. It just dawned on me that the guys that were keeping the coyotes in check are now more or less stockpiling them for the contests. We are covered up with them. My neighbor across the road spent tons of money putting up several miles of high fence with a four-foot net wire tied to the bottom and then staked down. This was to discourage the coyotes from digging under. He began restocking his ranch with Dorper ewes at $300 per head. About a month after buying the first set, a coyote dug under the fence and killed fourteen of the seventeen head that he bought. It seems that the best way to deter the coyotes is with Anatolian or Great Pyrenees guard dogs. The folks that have them are amazed at the effectiveness of the guard dogs. Unfortunately, the deer are not protected.

Kodak lol I was correcting MY ERROR! I'm anal about spelling etc and text with my tongue stuck out of the corner of my mouth :)

Kodak lol I was correcting MY ERROR! I'm anal about spelling etc and text with my tongue stuck out of the corner of my mouth :)

David McLendon-I always heard this also-is it a myth?

"if they were overhunted, the natural order of things would just create larger litters for a few years to compensate; under- hunted, or lack of food, the litters will just be smaller."

Increased litter size and population growth when eradication is attempted is well documented in lengthy studies.

It just doesn't happen in that conscious way that was sarcastically mentioned. That's the "myth" that's wrong.

It is not a myth.

There's an old Native American saying, that goes something like, 'when the last human on the earth dies, there will be a coyote to sing of their passing.' Probably so.

I hear em up on the mountain where I hunt but never see em

Mike, I think that has to be a myth, a Coyote can only carry as large of a litter as the body is capable of. Now on the other end of the scale I believe that certain stresses be they environmental or internal to te animal can limit/reduce litter size up to and including absorbing embryos. I ran retriever field trials for a lot of years and had a successful bitch that was sired by a National Field Champion and out of a Field Champion. She was hot both on the line and in the run, a real handful to run. Her line historically had difficulty with carrying a litter. I bred mine to a deceased sire via frozen surgical insemination two times and palpated and ultra-sounded 8 embryos the first time and nine the second. She absorbed all eight on the first attempt and eight on the second. Out of two breedings and 17 embryos I got one male pup and her with no milk since one pup didn't stimulate lactation or any maternal instinct. She wanted to eat him. Fortunately, a friend had a four day old litter his female took my singleton on with no issues. Bloodwork revealed that my female's cortisol levels were through the roof and the folks at UGA Small animal Hospital figured that was why she was absorbing embryos same as most of the other females of her line. So, yea I could see how environmental or internal stresses could/can work to reduce litter numbers or eliminate them completely but having more than normal due to some environmental condition or pressure, I don't buy into that part of it. Unless you could come up with the ability for the female to sprout an extra row of teats. ;)

David, Coyotes have little in common with your field dog bred by humans for thousands of years.

Coyotes are capable of carrying vast litters. They have been selected to do so by nature.

Your dog was enabled by humans to remain in the gene pool.

Interesting view, they are both Canids, and if we look inside the Coyote female, we'll find the same two horned uterus that domestic dogs have and typically the same number of teats, although I did have a female years ago that had an odd number. If in fact a Coyote were capable of "vast" litter numbers two things would happen, at birth pup size would be smaller and the milk supply would be spread thinner to the point that some would be habitually excluded. Both of those factors would result in higher mortality until numbers were reduced to a level that the female can support until weaning. Coyotes are intelligent and highly adaptable, as man encroached into their world and made it his, the natural predators of the Coyote were eliminated because they were also a threat to man's interests as he "tamed" his environment and changed it to suit him. Coyotes have pretty much run under the radar without predation and have thrived with high rates of litter survivability, not extraordinary litter numbers.

Runner,

Could you elaborate on your final statement? It doesn't make sense to me.

Sure, but Canids are not created equal. African Hunting dogs can have 20 in a litter.

Raising pups as a group allows higher litter numbers. That's not uncommon for Coyotes.

You continued to breed your dog despite all the difficulties that would have likely taken her out of the picture in a wild environment. That's not uncommon for domestic animals.

Ugg...

Guys….

It’s simple math. It takes X calories to carry an embryo to term. The natural order of things is to have as many offspring as possible.

If a female is really well fed, she’ll have a relatively large litter. No, I don’t have a specific number for you, but let’s assume that the practical maximum for litter size is one pup per teat. Any more than that, and somebody’s not going to eat. If they all get fed real well, they can grow up fast and start reproducing earlier than they would “normally” do.

OTOH… When females are sufficiently food-stressed, they stop ovulating altogether. If she’s not carrying enough stored calories to produce offspring, they won’t even get started. We see this among humans in anorexics and female endurance athletes who have gotten too lean. If they BECOME sufficiently stressed during a pregnancy, they can resorb a fetus. Or several. Cortisol is the stress hormone, and it sounds as though David’s dog had an imbalance that made her a real hard-driver, but also highly stressed, and that cortisol level was triggering resorption. Maybe if the cortisol level could be/have been lowered, the outcome would have been better. Guess I would defer to Nolz on that one.

In males, I’m pretty sure that stress/cortisol drives down testosterone levels… which could potentially reduce their contribution to the reproductive effort…

I put a pretty good dent in them for two years snaring when I had our acreage and saw a pretty good jump in deer numbers. Snaring is the best way to control them in my opinion. I don't think you will do much damage trying to shoot them.

"Guys…. It’s simple math. It takes X calories to carry an embryo to term. The natural order of things is to have as many offspring as possible.

If a female is really well fed, she’ll have a relatively large litter. No, I don’t have a specific number for you, but let’s assume that the practical maximum for litter size is one pup per teat. Any more than that, and somebody’s not going to eat. If they all get fed real well, they can grow up fast and start reproducing earlier than they would “normally” do"

consider this: Among wild canines, it is thought that the strategic role of pseudopregnancy may facilitate the alloparental care given to pups by subordinate adult females residing with the parents (Asa 1997; Asa and Valdespino 1998; Kreeger et al. 1991; Mech 1970). Helper females bring food back to the den and defend the offspring of the dominant female; but more remarkably, in some species, they also have the capacity to suckle the infant young (coyote: Camenzind 1978; dwarf mongoose: Creel 1996). These physiological and behavioral manifestations of maternal behavior are thought to be evoked by elevations of prolactin during the latter part of diestrus (

Gun I agree. I'm not good at snaring yet. I bought the foxpro spotlight that mounts on your gun. Called and killed my first with it this morning. It worked great. Way too many around here than I like. I respect their cunning survival skills but would like to see more fawns. Also I wont calve my cattle here because of them. Its war time with the yotes for me.

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