Evasive Action, by Walkaboutlou

26 Jan 2021 6 Comments

by yipps:janetkessler in coyote behavior

Hi Janet,

I was saving this for a while as it’s in some ways hard to hear but it also shows how incredibly intelligent and resourceful coyote are.

Locally, coyote aren’t truly abundant. They are common, but usually not seen by day. Often hunted, our regional coyote lay low in most areas.

A few years ago a local pack of staghounds/greyhound types were started to periodically sweep through various areas and hunt coyote. These weren’t for “problem” coyotes in conflict with livestock or community. It was in essence, any coyote anywhere at anytime.

At 1st, the pack succeeded in catching a few from what I heard. But within months, a pattern developed that seems to show how fast coyote react to stress.

1st of all, the coyote now know instantly what a staghound type of dog looks like and what it’s for. They scatter and hide in the landscape.

Also, if they are flushed, they consistently run for dangerous areas. Cliffs, rivers, etc. They know exactly how to run full bore through deadly terrain. Most dogs have to stop.

Another evasive action-in one area, they beeline for areas where no hunting is allowed. And in same area go to sheep, and right to the LGD dogs. 2 staghounds were seriously mauled literally running straight toward the enormous guards.

And the coyote was allegedly seen watching from hillside before escaping.

Lastly, same tactic…but other coyote make a run for a local bison herd. As the coyote runs among them, they stare, and then literally the hounds have had to run for their life. Bison don’t enjoy pack of canines running among them. And incredibly, they can keep pace with greyhound. No hunting there!

Are cliffs, rivers, LGD or Bison all coincidence? I leave that for people to decide. The hunters have decided to take their dogs elsewhere. Here, coyotes it seems, utilize the local conditions in evasive actions.

Again and again and again I have seen coyote always respond instantly to a new danger or situation.

The local coyote won this situation. And the hounds literally created very fit and hardened coyote quickly.

At any rate, you can interpret that as you wish.

I do think running to Bison or LGD was intentionally done. Both are pretty grumpy about space and noise.

Lou🐾

Hi Lou!  Another great story! Thank you!! Yes, these guys are incredibly, what’s the word, innovative, at staying alive — brilliant survivors — and your story shows this superbly. Their intelligence is just amazing, but even more amazing is how so few humans know or accept this.
Yes…I agree. One of the greatest human weaknesses is most don’t “see” or accept that other beings are just as alive and feeling as they are. Coyote..especially, are vigorously, vibrantly, vehemently, alive. And they will instantly and constantly adapt to remain so.
Personally, I look at them as supreme examples of living, in so many ways.
Lou🐾

Rough terrain

Update: This Gypsy/Divorced Coyote Has Found Himself YET Another Home!

21 Jan 2021 6 Comments

by yipps:janetkessler in "divorce", coyote behavior, families, family interactions

This posting covers the end of territory #4, territory #5 and the beginning of Territory #6. Most coyotes I’ve known retain their locations for years and years — but not this guy!

Here he is, only a few days ago, in his new home.

I last wrote about this fella, who I will call Monte here (I always use pronounceable names instead of numbers — they are easier to remember and don’t dehumanize them), after things had settled down a bit from the tumultuous events of a year ago: mating-for-life might be the norm in the coyote world, but it’s not hard-and-fast: see  Till Death Do Us Part? 

To sum up briefly, his mate had left him for another guy. Coyotes generally guard their mates during mating season, keeping all other suitors at bay. BUT, this fella was more interested in the food he was being offered daily than in guarding his mate. This required him to be away from his mate as he traveled the distance and then hung around for hours-on-end where he was being fed. He simply was not around her when the other guy came by and claimed her. In other words, he managed to neglected her entirely. Just like in the human world, coyote females (and males) respond to kindness, time, and attention: read Walkaboutlou’s courtship story about Slim Jim and Chica.

His ex (Maam) and her new mate (Blue) retained that old far-off territory (#4) — it was at the other end of the city — whereas HE moved back to a previously owned territory of his (#5), following in the wake of a son, Cape, who could not stay in that territory with Blue’s takeover. Cape had remained with his parents ever since his birth and over the previous two years, and now he was displaced from that territorial home (#4). He returned to the only other home he had ever known, and Monte followed several weeks later. At about the same time that they moved back, a 9-month old dispersing female, Vida, from another family joined them on that previously owned territory (#5) — this happened almost exactly a year ago. The threesome formed their own unique “family” and they all could be seen chasing and playing with each other happily and regularly, hunting, trekking together, and howling at the sirens and sometimes at dogs that upset them. This family continued this way on this territory for about eight months.

Some photos of him and his family in his previous life in 2020

And here, human feeding popped up again as a driving factor in this story. There was a hand-feeder who actually interacted regularly with this coyote on this territory #5. Our coyote, Monte, had learned to wait for and expect food from this person as part of his daily routine, as he had in his previous territory, but in this case, over several years and even before Monte left for territory #5, there had developed an eye-popping bond between feeder and coyote which I have never witnessed before, and I’ll be writing about it in another posting soon. I’ve already written profusely about the detrimental effects of feeding coyotes, and this coyote was a victim of that. See: Abused, and the linked articles therein.

As fate would have it, in October, that prolific hand-feeder died of cancer, and right after her ashes were spread (as she had requested), interestingly, Monte left. I don’t think he left solely because the feeder was gone, but I think the feeder’s disappearance was a major factor. It was also time to start looking for a mate: he had been without one for 8 months.  Upon his departure, the territory he had returned to and was living on with Vida and Cape reverted to — or was ceded to — those two younger coyotes: his son and also to the little female who had joined them.

And so our fellow Monte moved on to a new park where he wandered for awhile as an interloper until he found a niche and settled down there. He has lived here now for the past three months, with . . .  his new girl!! He had fallen off of my radar for a couple of months, so you can imagine my thrill when I finally found him with the help of some photos and sightings from other people. I’m sure only Monte and I carry his fascinating and convoluted story with us as a first-hand memory. To everyone else who doesn’t know him, he’s just another coyote, unless you’ve read about him here on my blog.

Here he is with his new mate, and as you can see in the lower photo, he (and she) are very interested in all those hormones which are soaring right now: he sniffs and licks, and she’s happy to let him do so. Mating season is about to begin, so I guess he’ll have another family.

Note that my work is accomplished visually and without the use of tags or radio-collars. I identify each coyote by their unique faces.  I use DNA analysis from scat (which will be analyzed by Monica Serrano at Dr. Benjamin Sacks’ lab at UC Davis) to confirm what I see. Although I haven’t been able to pick up Monte’s scat from every location, I have collected enough in most places, and then photos elsewhere, as hard-evidence of what I’ve found. See my most recent presentation.

© All information and photos in my postings come from my own original and first-hand documentation work which I am happy to share, with permission and with properly displayed credit: ©janetkessler/coyoteyipps.com.

Mom Tells Off Her Son, and Dad Stands By

16 Jan 2021 10 Comments

by yipps:janetkessler in communication, coyote behavior, families, family interactions, feelings & emotions, mother coyote behavior, mother/pup learning

The family was out together, all four of them: Mom, Dad, Daughter and her brother. It’s not often that we see the young daughter: she’s just not comfortable at this point being out when people look at her. The minute she feels noticed, she hurries off and disappears into the surrounding foliage.

Her brother also dislikes being watched. This makes a lot of sense: in the wild, if any animal looks at another animal, it’s probably a predator sizing it up as prey. But brother has become more tolerant of humans eyeing him than his sister. He might leave an area if he feels the focus is on him, but he inevitably returns to the same spot, especially if his parents are out there.

So after Sis left today, only Mom and Dad and Son were out. They wandered around a little, and then Dad moved further away from the others. Suddenly Mom was beating up Son: he was on his back and she was standing over him with teeth bared. Yikes! She seems to have a short temper recently.  She got annoyed at Dad recently while I was watching: I think simply because he bumped into her, maybe brushed against her or stepped on her heels. She not only snarled at him, but she then acted on her “words” and let him know who was boss by raising herself above him: it was an instance of interpersonal coyote communication and interactions showing HER emotional response to him, and HIS tolerance and total deference to her.

What happened with the youngster today? I didn’t see it, it happened very quickly, but probably the same thing. I’ve seen dogs get pretty upset when they’ve been bumped — nothing else but a clumsy bump — by another dog, and maybe something like this happened today. It’s probably disrespectful. Anyway, here are the photos of Mom letting little guy have it with snarls and growls. Dad soon arrived and seemed to take sides with Mom. He may have had to — if you know what I mean. In fact, Mom in this family is the “top dog”.

Eventually, after making sure Son got the message, the two parents walked off. And the little guy stayed behind. He looked dumbfounded, like he had no clue why that had been so intense: “What did I do?” But he knew he was not invited to follow his parents. Parents proceeded to walk around the periphery of their park together, and Son stayed right where he was, searching for gophers, alone.

Maybe this was just a temper-tantrum on Mom’s part — maybe she just wanted a little more respect from him? Then again, maybe she’s setting the stage for dispersal. The earliest dispersal I’ve seen occurred when a pup was nine-months old, which is what this pup is now. We’ll have to see what happens next..

© All information and photos in my postings come from my own original and first-hand documentation work which I am happy to share, with permission and with properly displayed credit: ©janetkessler/coyoteyipps.com.

 

Family Interrupted: Update

10 Jan 2021 4 Comments

by yipps:janetkessler in coyote behavior, families, family interactions

Last October I wrote about a “family interrupted”. A coyote mom, Bonnie, suddenly disappeared from her family (I’ll call this family #3), leaving three five-month-old pups and a very shy dad, Clyde. Territories are best defended by an alpha pair, but there was no longer a pair here to work as a defending team. Within a few short weeks, intruders (family #4) came and took over the territory. It’s actually a very complicated story: nothing is as cut-and-dry as it seems in the coyote world, and unless you are actually there to catch the nuances, you might miss the essence of what is going on.

The intruder males from what has been family #4 — consisting of an alpha male, Blue, an alpha female, Maam, and the male’s younger brother, Buff — were actually related to the disappeared mom, Bonnie, and had lived on this territory with her for over a year (as family #2) during the previous year, having migrated over from a nearby territory which they had occupied long-term until that point and still visited fairly regularly. I’m not sure what sparked their move from that other territory, but it could have been that the old alphas passed away or simply left — I’ve seen the abandoning of territories by older alphas a number of times (due either to a territorial battle, or even without such provocation). What remained of that family #2 — three siblings consisting of two males and a female — were able to move here from that nearby territory when the long-term previous alphas on this territory left. (I hope I haven’t lost you yet). That was family #1 on this territory. The dad, Ivan, had been here at least 12 years — the alpha female, Maya, was a more recent arrival. They appeared to have ceded the land to their two-year old daughter, who, even with repeated beatings and body slams by her mother, would not leave/disperse. So they (the alphas, Ivan and Maya) left.

This daughter, Sissy, attempted wooing one of the newcomer males (the dominant male from family #2), but this didn’t work out — yes, even coyotes are fickle and choosy in picking their lifelong mates. This male eventually and somehow became hostile towards Sissy. Sissy became scared, nervous and flighty, and then one day she was gone for good: the family of the fella she was trying to woo, took over (this is family #2). We had only ever seen the two males, Blue and Buff here, but now, with no females around, their sister, Bonnie, joined them.

At the end of about a year, the two brothers left, leaving Bonnie and her new mate, Clyde to claim the territory and raise their litter of three. The departed older brother, Blue, found a mate, Maam, and another territory, and younger brother, Buff, stayed with them. I don’t know which happened first: that Bonnie found Clyde and then the brothers left, or the other way around. At any rate, as Bonnie raised her litter, only her nuclear family (family #3) lived here.

But then Bonnie suddenly disappeared, as I stated above. The vacancy (semi-vacancy of the territory) caused by her absence apparently attracted the intruders.

Anyway, even if you can’t keep track of all that — and I must say, even I hardly can — what we have here now on this territory is a reconfigured family which includes one of Bonnie’s pups.

I was fascinated to watch one of Bonnie’s pups, Bolder, begging to be included in this family. I saw it happen. I can only guess that the youngster knew she had a greater chance of survival by joining the intruders.

So now we have this unusual family. It consists of a mom, Maam, a dad, Blue, and dad’s younger brother, Buff, and one of Bonnie’s offspring who is now 9 months old, a female I call Bolder. I have not seen Maam and Blue’s pups, though I know they had them because I saw Maam lactating in April and May. And up through today, I’ve not seen any of their youngsters trekking with their parents, which is normal as far as I have seen for almost all pups at this stage. In the few cases where I have seen the pups venture further with their parents — and yes, there are such individuals — I think it is due to a less wary personality, along with picking up behavioral fearlessness towards humans from their mostly fed parents.

This reconfigured family #5, then, has a hierarchy which runs from alpha Maam who is top dog, to the alpha Blue who is her mate, then her mate’s younger brother, Buff who is very submissive towards his older brother, but rather bold in other respects, and finally the little squirt, Bolder, who, although she keeps out of the way a lot of the time, she nevertheless travels with them sometimes. There seems to be a kind of push-pull in her relationship with the rest of family #5, and I get the impression from the others in that family that she’s considered a nuisance by them, though allowed to stay and hang on. I see her with them, but also I see her run from them in fear.

Very sporadically — but enough so that I know they are still around — I see Bolder’s dad, Clyde, and a brother of Bolder’s, Shier, so I’m still trying to figure out this territorial situation and these families.

And here are a couple of recent photos of that reconfigured family.

younger brother, older brother and alpha male, Bonnie’s female pup, alpha female [photo: Janti Sommer]

From left to right: alpha male older brother, pup, younger brother, alpha female [photo: Janti Sommer]

Update on Sparks

03 Jan 2021 6 Comments

by yipps:janetkessler in coyote behavior, dispersal, territoriality

Sparks is alive and well in the Presidio where he has resided for several months now. I have followed him since his birth in 2019 where I watched him grow up with four siblings, and then through his dispersal journey much of which I’ve written about here on my blog (put “Sparks” into the search box). During his dispersal to date — a dispersal which began in March of 2020 — he stopped for weeks-on-end at various locations where he either remained temporarily with his sister (she returned to her birthplace), or in other locations he remained alone, and he even was accepted temporarily into an established alpha family (alpha mom, alpha dad, two of three remaining pups) where he interacted, played with, hunted with, and cuddled with the family he stayed with. He seems to get along well with new coyotes he meets. He always moved on. I have seen dispersing youngsters repulsed from established territories, so his situation has been very interesting for me.

And now he is at the Presidio where every evening he meets up with a little female coyote: they rendezvous and howl and yip before running off together for the evening’s activities. I have not identified his special friend yet. I’m wondering if this is his final home, or just another stopping place? He has been here for months, and in fact he had come through the area at the end of the summer and then left before returning and remaining. Maybe he left because of a broken arm he acquired at that time: I could not detect a limp when I last saw him.

The established alphas in the Presidio have been there over a year: Wired and Puff. They had three pups this year.  I’ve written about both of these coyotes before. I’m now trying to figure out Sparks’ current relationship with (position in) Wired’s family. Wired and Puff could easily have driven him out, but they didn’t, as hadn’t the previous family Sparks stayed with. Rather, he formed a warm friendship and bond with them. I wonder if he’s been “adopted” into Wired’s family (as he had been temporarily into Cai2’s family), or if he’s forming a family of his own. It seems that it might be beneficial for Wired and Puff to have an amicable neighbor such as Sparks who they get along with and like, rather than a hostile one. So maybe it’s being allowed on purpose. According to the territories I’ve worked out in San Francisco — they average about 1.5 square miles — the Presidio is actually big enough for more than one family.

Sparks’ story continues to unfold. In the middle of January, 2021, he was seen being driven away from the Presidio at dawn by the Presidio’s breeding alpha male — the two fled down Lyon Street which borders the Presidio, one chasing and the other fleeing. I have not seen this fellow since then. I will update as I can. :((

© All information and photos in my postings come from my own original and first-hand documentation work which I am happy to share, with permission and with properly displayed credit: ©janetkessler/coyoteyipps.com.

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