Coyote Yipps

Dad was with his year old daughter Bold today.  She is a chip off the old block.  I’ve included photographs of the video’s featured players.  Dad makes a brief appearance at the beginning of the video before leaving for the brush.  Once in the brush, I’m never sure where or how much closer he will be when he next appears.  Fortunately, at the point where the video was captured, he was content to let his daughter handle the man and leashed dog.  A few minutes earlier he had approached to within ten to fifteen feet of Holtz where Holtz was straining on his leash, barking at Dad.  Bold was hidden in the brush barking.  Dad was way too close so I lobbed a golf ball towards him and he backed off.  The ball bounced near him and I didn’t intend to either throw the ball hard or to hit him.  Once a good distance was established I turned and walked towards the exit.  Both followed.  From beneath the bridge under their road, I set up for video capture.  As in the past when encountering two approaching coyotes, one coyote stays back while the other advances.  Bold didn’t come as close as Dad had.  Note that much of the ambient noise in the video is from traffic on a four-lane street bordering the north of their field.  All the vocalizations today came from Bold.

Earlier this year I had thought by her demeanor Bold was perhaps mature enough to disperse.  She is confident and has confrontation skills.  Yet here she remains after having learned a great deal from her parents.  I’m hoping that Mom has had her puppies and to see them in a couple months.  I wonder if the two undispersed year old daughters will help their parents supervise the new puppies and hope I am fortunate enough to observe them do so.  Janet has mentioned that a coyote specialist at the humane society said that young ones normally leave home between two and three years of age.  Perhaps young coyotes learn child rearing skills by observing their parents raise a new litter.  Perhaps they aren’t ready to leave and start a family of their own until they have seen how raising pups is done.

Posting written by Charles Wood. Visit Charles Wood’s website for these and more coyote photos:Charles Wood. His work is copyrighted and may only be used with his explicit permission.