Here’s a full 20 minute presentation I created for my/our new site: CoyoteCoexistence.Com. I began the site with a couple of friends in order to stop the trapping and killing of coyotes in Atlanta last fall.
It’s through Yipps that we connected for this project. We organized and flew to Atlanta to present the case against trapping at a town meeting. We printed a large packet of flyers and helped publicize the event. In the end, money that had been collected to hire a trapper was returned — the trapper was not hired! This was a clear sign that we should proceed with our efforts!
Presentation Title Page
This video is an aid for future presentations. It is cutting-edge in its unique approach, concentrating on coyote himself! A muted version will also be available for presentation by others at meetings, and so will shorter clips of specific sub-topics, such as “shooing-off”. Contact CoyoteCoexistence.Com at our email on that site for further information.
For several years I’ve visited a nearby field to watch two coyote parents whom I named Mom and Dad. In November 2012 I found that a new coyote couple had replaced Mom and Dad as the field’s resident coyotes. I named them Rufous and Mary.
One possible difference between Mom and Dad’s behavior compared to Rufous and Mary’s is that Mom and Dad did not seem to howl at emergency vehicle sirens. Consider my August 22, 2012 post: A Brief Show. The video included there showed Mom ignoring both the siren and her youngsters’ howls in reply. My general impression after many observations was that Mom and Dad just didn’t bother with howling back at sirens. I always thought that restraint showed how intelligent Mom and Dad are.
In contrast, the video included with this post shows Rufous howling at sirens. A little earlier, Rufous and Mary, both hidden, were howling at the sirens.
I was able to get a really good zoomed-in shot of the limping coyote’s injured leg. I first noted the limp about two weeks ago.
I have no idea if this laceration to the heel and maybe even the Achille’s tendon, as shown in the photo, is what caused the limp, but the laceration looks pretty recent.
Below is a video showing a few seconds of her gait — two weeks after I first noted the injury. She is no longer holding the leg up, but you can see that she is being very careful when putting weight on the leg.
A few days ago, as she crossed a field, I could see that her steps were uneven and jerky, as if she were almost “tripping” every few steps. So the leg has not healed, but it looks like it is improving: she is no longer holding it up when she walks.
Behaviorally, this coyote has been keeping out of view, and I wonder if it is to protect herself during a time when she might not be able to defend herself well or run away quickly should she need to do so.
For several years I have been visiting a nearby field to watch two coyote parents whom I named Mom and Dad. In November 2012 I found that a new coyote couple had replaced Mom and Dad as the field’s resident coyotes. I named them Rufous and Mary.
Mary being a timid coyote, it has taken me a couple of months to get a close up photograph of her. Rufous isn’t timid and the video begins with him.
After having repeatedly scraped dirt to territorially message my leashed dogs, the video begins with Rufous assessing his effect on us. At this point, Rufous expected us to have either run from him or chased him. Yet we hadn’t moved at all. He wants us to show him we got the message, to show him so by moving. To Rufous we seem really slow in delivering a reply via our feet.
So what’s Rufous to do? Send the message again? Wait? The pause comes from my having constrained my dogs’ ability to communicate, restricted their ability to move. Motion is communication for canines and by now my dogs would have run away except for my influence. I resolved the uncertainty and tension by lobbing a golf ball toward Rufous.
Rufous trots away. Note that a chain link fence separated us and that he was closer to us than a coyote should be allowed to approach, too close for me to just turn and walk away. I needed distance from Rufous in order to leave and he gave it to me when I asked him for it with a softly tossed golf ball.
Mary
The next two scenes show Rufous approaching his den area. Mary is waiting there in the brush near the center and if you observe carefully you will see her move slightly. The last scene shows Rufous waiting for us to leave. Mary is off camera and Rufous looks back in her direction
The video shows that to my dogs, Rufous ritualistically messaged his claim to both Mary and the den, communicated those claims in a way that any canine would understand. Deviation from canine expected motion, communication, came from my desire to spectate instead of move.
Posting written by Charles Wood. Visit Charles Wood’s website for more coyote photos: Charles Wood. His work is copyrighted and may only be used with his explicit permission.
Two coyotes recently moved into a den area formerly used by Mom and Dad, a coyote couple I have been watching since 2009. I named these new coyotes Rufous and Mary even though I haven’t confirmed Mary as female.
Reproductive success in coyotes depends on a coyote couple acquiring and holding territory. Territory has been defined as the area an animal “will defend against individuals of the same species (Burt 1943; Mech 1970).” * The video shows Rufous acting like he owns Mom and Dad’s den area, shows that he defends it against Holtz and Lucas, my two dogs. It then follows that Mom and Dad’s den area now belongs to Rufous and Mary. Rufous and Mary are counting on this territory for their reproductive success.
The video consists of nine clips and opens with workers and their vehicles on the edge of the den area to camera left. The next day, the workers finished their task and departed just as I arrived. The second segment is about half an hour later. Rufous emerges from the den area right where the workers had just been. Clearly, he lives in and around the den area.
The third segment shows Rufous calmly sitting. I’m standing and my dogs are sitting quietly. I wanted Rufous to remain calm and where he was. So I experimented. As Rufous raised himself, I crouched. Perhaps following my lead, Rufous then stretched and got down.
Next, Mary appears behind Rufous to his left. Although I haven’t confirmed her sex, I feel she must be his mate.
The next day, Rufous came south along the dirt road and approached the den area entrance. The video picks up at about the same place he was the day before. Rufous enters the brush. Once in the brush, and after I stopped the camera, he called out to Mary with short howls. I didn’t hear her answer.
A few minutes later Rufus came out to defend his territory. He approached us calmly. The sixth clip shows Rufous pick up a piece of wood. He moves off camera and drops the wood. Back on camera, Rufous carries an orange plastic warning cone he picked up off camera. The seventh clip shows Rufous rubbing against the prized cone. In my view, Rufous knows my dogs envy any object that he gnaws, carries, or rubs. Rufous showed my dogs that he has the power over desirable objects in his domain.
In the eighth clip, Rufous calmly makes his bed and gets down. As long as he is compelled by territoriality to watch us, he might as well appear cool and comfortable. However Rufous’ yawn betrays his inner tension.
The last clip shows Holtz with his back to Rufous while Lucas instead intently watches. We are separated from Rufous by a chain link fence. Holtz is telling Rufous he wants to disengage. However a coyote is still a novelty to Lucas. He doesn’t really understand territory and reproduction, can’t completely understand a coyote. Like a child, Lucas just wants the stick and cone. Lucas sees wild, but Lucas does not fully comprehend it. Holtz has seen enough of wild to know he doesn’t really want to look.
The Gese article quoted above contains the best clues about what happened to Mom and Dad. Instead of evicting Rufous and Mary, Mom and Dad were evicted by them in all likelihood. By himself, Dad probably wouldn’t have been a match for Rufous. Mom, from observations I made over the last six months, is old and achy, probably wouldn’t have been as much help as when she was younger. Mom and Dad’s pack size was low in 2012, a couple yearlings and a puppy where the yearlings may have dispersed though perhaps one yearling became Rufous’ Mary.
Rufous, who I first saw in early September, probably made persistent incursions. I imagine he just wouldn’t go away despite Mom and Dad’s howling, despite their scent marking, and despite their displays. Perhaps there was a physical confrontations. Gese describes physical contacts on page 983 “The resident coyote often rolled the intruder when first making contact, then bit or grappled with the intruder, at times inflicting visible wounds and causing bleeding. These fights usually lasted only 5–15 s, at which time the resident would release its hold on the intruder, then the intruder would typically withdraw from the resident animal while performing ritualized submissive postures with tail tucked, head held low, mouth gaping, and ears held flat. In 7 instances the resident coyote attacked the intruder multiple times (2–5 attacks) until the intruder crossed the territory boundary, whereupon the attacks were terminated.” Mom and Dad could have tried physical contact to evict Rufous and Rufous could have turned the tables on Mom and Dad. It is also possible that Rufous tried physical contact to evict Mom and Dad and won, perceiving himself to be resident on the territory and perceiving Mom and Dad as intruders.
Fatalities from physical contact between resident and intruding coyotes is considered rare. From Gese, page 985 “Physical contact involving ritualized behaviors or fighting (Schenkel 1947; Moran et al. 1981; Mech 1993) was observed when residents caught up to an intruder. In contrast to wolves (Van Ballenberghe and Erickson 1973; Mech 1994), no intruding coyotes were killed when the resident pack encountered them. Bekoff and Wells (1986) also observed no fatal encounters during territory defense. Okoniewski (1982) reported the rare occurrence of a fatal encounter between coyotes.”
My reading of Gese’s observations and of his references to the literature is that it isn’t the coyote way to kill intruding coyotes. Making a coyote intruder give up and run is enough of a win for a resident coyote.
I reason that it is also the coyote way for an intruder to not kill a resident coyote. In fact, it is we humans who identify residents and intruders. Yet in the final analysis, it is the coyote’s concept of itself and of its status in a territory that determines much of coyote behavior. My first impression of Rufous back in September 2012 was that he acted like he thought he owned the place. Mom and Dad may have seemed as intruders to Rufous, where he perceived himself as resident. Rufous may well have come to see Mom and Dad as just two of many intruder coyotes that he, as resident, would need to perpetually chase out of his territory. If there was a physical confrontation, as a self-perceived resident coyote, Rufous would have followed the way of resident coyotes where intruders are not killed. On the other hand, Rufous may not have perceived himself as resident at the time of a conjectured physical confrontation. In my view, his winning that confrontation would have instantly given him the mindset of a resident coyote. Either way, resident before or resident as the outcome of physical confrontation, as a resident, Rufous would have followed the coyote way and would not have killed Mom and Dad. It may simply be the case that coyotes in territorial disputes, irrespective of resident/intruder status, don’t kill each other where submission and flight is an effective inhibitor on the winner.
As I searched for the howling, I left my camera on. It’s a large camera, so as I walked I had it in my hand sort of balanced on my shoulder to support it. I thought that even if I didn’t end up getting a photo or video of whoever was howling, at least I would have a recording of the sound. After I got home and reviewed the video, I thought, hey, the “searching” was actually the fun part in this video — I could not see much of anything until the coyote was outlined against the lighter dawning sky, but my jerking paces as I headed towards the sounds are recorded. So I preserved the video as is, except one minute of it right before the end while the coyote was just standing there.
In addition, what you are hearing is a male coyote barking — he’s the one I eventually locate. But a female is answering his barks, with her own higher pitched howling, which includes tremolos. The male began barking alone — that is what I heard initially. Then the female began responding. And finally, only the female can be heard in the distance. About a minute after all howling ceased everything was still and the male just looked around. I cut this part out because it made the video too long. Then the male sniffed the ground and headed off on a trek alone.
On New Year’s Day I saw two coyotes just outside my Mom and Dad coyote’s den area. They were the same two I saw there on November 22, 2012. My November 23 and November 26, 2012 posts speculated that the two were either passing through or living there. With respect to my dogs, the new coyotes have on two occasions messaged them that the area is theirs. It is likely that these two new coyotes have made themselves at home and don’t want my dogs to even think of doing the same.
NewMale
Pictured is a coyote male known formerly as “New Gal” in my two November posts. In November his left eye showed an injury and the more recent picture reveals his eye to possibly be blind. I am still unable to tell the sex of his companion.
The video clip begins with a view of his companion. It’s watching my dogs and me while the male is watching off camera. A view of the male heading back to his companion concludes the clip.
The new coyotes could well be mates. Pupping season is just around the corner and coyote couples do need to make preparations. Mom and Dad’s den area no doubt has several ready-made dens, is brushy, isolated, has its own water supply, and has surrounds replete with rabbits, frogs, lizards, snakes, rats, mice, and birds available for the repasts of a coyote family. The property is improved, having deserted dirt roads for comfortable transit and landscaped embankments from which to take a look at things. Although humans do pass by they rarely tarry, mostly going quickly to and fro on comfortably distant and raised, highly visible paths. It’s an area well suited to a coyote couple’s needs where the only real worry comes from the envy of other coyotes. If the new coyotes are mates, the female seems ineffectual. However, the male is superb. He seems to be all the coyote that she is ever going to need.
The new coyotes could be siblings, or could be father and child. Time may tell just as time may tell us what happened to Mom and Dad, holders of the property for at least the last four years.
I last saw Mom and Dad in late October as they reconnoitered the den area. Since then they appear to have lost ground. Mom and Dad may never return to the den area, perhaps having lost it in a fight. Yet perhaps they allowed newcomers in without a fight. At this time of year they may need that space less. In fact, in past falls and winters I saw little of Mom and Dad there. Also, Mom and Dad’s family seems to include only one puppy and no yearlings, where the den area’s food may not be necessary. It may not now be an area important enough to defend; and perhaps not important later because there must be other areas in their home range that could well serve them in pupping. Considering the entirety of Mom and Dad’s home range, with the newcomers there are still only five coyotes in an area that in the past supported as many as seven. At this point I can’t say if Mom and Dad made a losing stand on some principle of ownership or if instead they just walked away from a fight for lack of anything to fight about.
There is another intriguing possibility. The new male’s companion might be one of Mom and Dad’s female yearlings. It could be that an intergenerational transfer of land-tenure explains the presence of the new tenants, a mixing of old and new blood with benefits for all. Although typically coyote young disperse, some coyote apples may not fall far from the tree.
Posting written by Charles Wood. Visit Charles Wood’s website for more coyote photos: Charles Wood. His work is copyrighted and may only be used with his explicit permission.
These fist punches are not as forceful as the fist and nose punches which are supposed to deliver enough blow to incapacitate or stun. Here, the back legs never leave the ground. Instead, these milder punches appear to be “exploratory” in nature, possibly to get a critter to scurry through the underground tunnel so it can be heard, or to even collapse underground tunnels.
If the coyote hears movement below the surface, or feels that it is onto something, digging may follow, as in the video at the bottom. However, as seen by the first two videos, sometimes no digging at all follows the punch, because nothing was heard. In all three cases here, these coyotes came up with nothing for their efforts: either the gopher or mole got away, or maybe wasn’t even there to begin with.
Punch
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Punch, then looking for movement and listening for possible activity below ground
PUNCH
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Another punch, and then listening and looking for possible signs of life below
Swimmers have to come up for air, or they’ll get water in their lungs. Coyotes, too, have to come up for air, or they’ll get dirt in their lungs — or maybe not enough air into their lungs. Watch the coyote stuff his snout deep into the hole, and then lift it out just enough to get fresh air, and then stuff it back in, and repeat this sequence several times.This video clip shows three instances of coming up for air, and also some intense digging.
He stands in front of her waiting for the routine grooming and tick removal which has become an everyday occurrence between these two. But she is busy grooming herself this time. He stands patiently, but she does not respond — she continues grooming herself. Finally, he lets her know more forcefully by engaging her muzzle — “can’t you see what I want?” Whether she sees it or not, she does not respond. He then plops himself right in front of her — maybe this might get a response? But no, she concentrates on her own grooming. Finally she heads off. He watches, a bit defeated, and then follows her.
I’ve seen this “request” a number of times now in several coyote pairs. More often than not, one ends up grooming the next one. Maybe it involves a request to relieve a particularly bad skin itch or pain. I always wonder why the service is not a mutual one.
This post is an afterward to my post on November 23, 2012 about a new female coyote I saw on Thanksgiving. Included in that post is a segment of video where a female coyote looked like she was stalking. Here I offer additional video from that day. I hope it will better contextualize her behavior. When viewing the video, please remember my dogs are tied off and separated from the coyotes by a chain link fence.
The additional video picks up where the earlier one left off. I am back at camera after tossing a golf ball and the new female is shown going away.
After that we see where she came from. Still there, her coyote companion continued to survey the scene. (The new female is sitting down in the lower right.) Having tired of waiting for me to leave with my dogs, she apparently decided to message us again.
She walked in our direction. At that point I could easily have stomped and yelled. Had I done so, I’m sure she would have stopped and turned around. She was approaching this time with comparatively less energy, even stopping to groom. Each time she slowed down or stopped was another opportunity for me to message her. Note that as she got closer she yawned. I see coyote yawns in these circumstances as involuntarily betraying anxiety. Continuing, the new female was distracted and stopped to sniff. Again, she was not overly interested in having to message us again and her pause was another opportunity for me to move her back with a stomp or a yell. She came forward and yawned, another opportunity to move her back. Since I made no objection, she moved forward a bit. Then she stopped to appraise, and came forward more. One of my dogs began to bark. I reassuringly went to my dogs and made myself big. She responded at once and moved back to where she started.
The last segment shows the new female and her companion, now to our left. Her companion chose to be visible. She instead used a small rise to partially conceal herself from my dogs and me. Soon I could no longer see her. Her companion also didn’t seem to know where she went, my losing track of it as it looked around for her. My dogs seemed to suspect her location, but appeared to be barking aimlessly. It was dusk, getting cold, and I decided to leave.
The two coyotes were almost exclusively focused on my dogs. I think the new female wanted them to run away. Until I acted, I was just a placeholder, a possible complication. Even so, when I softly tossed a golf ball during the first approach, she immediately went away. I think she understands that she isn’t able to deal with a human. I think her second approach was consequently less vigorous than her first. From her first try, I think she learned that in this situation she indeed had to deal with a human, not just with dogs. In her second approach, I think she acted deflated. However she was able to find a dignified way to leave after the second try.
I am struck by how dependent the companion was on the new female. At first I suspected they were mates. However, their actual behavior was more parent-child than mates. For example, my Dad coyote, when Mom takes action, doesn’t stand around all flighty and looking like a gulping coward confused about what’s going to happen next. Mom, when Dad acts, is alert and in tune. The companion appeared as in training, not as a mate. It acted like her baby. She arguably acted parentally to be rid of unwelcome dogs. Just maybe the companion isn’t a yearling yet, is instead only about seven months old. If so, that would help explain a behavior that otherwise approached aberrance. The only time my Mom and Dad coyote act similarly is when they have small ones around. It is starting to look like both these coyotes are new to me, are mother and child, and were probably just passing through Mom and Dad’s territory.
This is a male coyote responding to the sounds of a siren. Doesn’t look like he’s too into it! The siren petered out quickly, and so did any enthusiasm for howling!
Male vocalizations appear to be lower pitched than females, and consist of more actual barks than howls. I’ve never heard a male sustain a tremolo the way a female does — I wonder if this is a generalizable truth, or if it is just so for the coyotes I’ve heard?
The video is five clips combined. Each part shares the same setting. The first shows Mom and Dad lounging in late afternoon sun. Coyotes are territorial and they are relaxing in one of their spots.
The second clip shows one of their yearlings standing possessively over the same spot claimed by Mom and Dad. Mom and Dad share their territory with their children. It is normal for a yearling to make claims on its parents’ territory.
The third part shows Mom and Dad scraping dirt in view of my dogs. Their display tells my dogs that Mom and Dad still claim the area. Near the end of that part, a rabbit in the upper left decides to take flight.
The first three parts were taken during October 2012. I last saw Mom and Dad in that particular area late in October. I looked for Mom and Dad almost every day during this November, not seeing them. It has been their habit each year to stop coming to that area in Fall, not to be seen there again until the following Spring.
The fourth part begins with what I assume is one of Mom and Dad’s yearlings, claiming the same spot as is typical. It isn’t a formidable coyote at eighteen months and asserts itself only with a stare, of sorts. Then, out in front of the yearling walks a formidable coyote that I had never seen before.
The fifth and last part shows the new coyote approaching my dogs. It has little interest in me. I later confirmed it is a female. I don’t think it looks a bit like Mom or Dad. She just couldn’t be a sibling I missed somehow?
My two dogs were leashed and tied off to a chain link fence separating us from the approaching coyote. She wrongly thought that it was alright to test my dogs. When she got close, my dogs having begun to ineffectually bark, I softly tossed a golf ball in her direction. She backed off immediately.
The new female and the yearling eventually left the area together. The yearling had kept the new female in sight at all times, and moved towards her when the new female started to leave the area. I judged the yearling to be dependent, or subordinate to the new female. The yearling didn’t seem to have the mettle for a territorial contest and was engrossed in the new female’s actions.
Ordinarily the yearling is, or has been, subordinate to just Mom and Dad. I haven’t been able to determine if the yearling is male or female. Yet by all appearances, the new female appears to have robbed the cradle where the yearling (male??) follows her around like a puppy! I could have never imagined such an eventuality! Then again, I may really just be imagining things. Nevertheless, I haven’t a clue as to how Mom and Dad coyote might feel about the apparent romance. If the new female isn’t a sibling I somehow missed, then neither do I have a clue about how Mom and Dad feel about having an unrelated female around who acts like part of their territory is now hers.
The video clip, out of focus for the first ten seconds, shows Mom and Dad as they typically travel together on this particular stretch of road. The clip begins as they trot along together. Then both pause to reconnoiter, watchful and alert. They move on. Dad takes the low ground and Mom has his back, positioning herself on high ground. She is ready to either defend his rear or to join Dad should he encounter foe. Out of view, my guess is that Dad is investigating a scent. Momentarily Mom hurries to join him.
Mom and Dad come back into view and stop at a scent. They both mark it and scrape. Probably they are messaging my dogs and me and are at the same time, more importantly, marking over scent left by an intruder. Mom and Dad both leave their mark to be read by any interested coyotes. It says, “Team Mom and Dad are here. Stay away.”
Dad lingers for more investigative scent sniffing while Mom hurries toward an entrance to the den area. Dad trots to catch up with her. In the final seconds of the clip, Dad scoots past Mom, leading their way into fairly dense brush. I don’t think Dad was pushing to lead Mom, or trying to get ahead of her so he could lead, protect and serve. I think instead Mom just happened to slow down so as to sniff something and Dad just happened to pass her.
Mom, Dad, and their family don’t spend all their time in or in proximity to their den area, are away from there for hours at a time. Upon returning, they reclaim it by marking, clear out any intruders, and eventually meet up with other family members. In short, they sweep the area clear before settling in. Once settled, they attend to family matters and guard their space.
Here you have a video, showing a coyote burying something from almost start to finish. I snapped the photo to the left immediately beforehand — it was twilight and I could barely see, but my camera did well. The photo shows the size of the prey the coyote is carrying. It looks about the size of a gopher.
Then, under those extremely bad twilight lighting conditions I was able to video almost the entire sequence of the coyote burying his prey and covering up the evidence. The coyote began by poking his prey down into the ground as far as possible with his snout, and then used his snout to cover it up with leaves and debris. There was no “digging out a hole” beforehand in this case.
We have seen coyotes bury items for an apparent variety of reasons. Sometimes we’ve seen coyotes bury items they like to roll in: Burying Perfume Bottle or Another Burial. And, at other times, they bury prey that can be consumed later: Buried Rabbit Found or A Burial: Coyote Behavior. The absolute best observation was by a contributor, Heather, who saw a coyote bury a rock! Burying a rock.
