Coyote Facts

 

“The laughter of the fields and woods” – Audrey Tourney

 

Characteristics:

• Approximately 3’ in length and weighs as much as 50lbs. It is medium sized with gray and black markings with a reddish ting and mostly white underneath. The big bushy tail is tipped with black and has a long slender muzzle.
• Like most predators, the coyote utilizes its sense of smell and hearing more so then their eyesight for survival.
• They are very social, where the family unit consists of the mating pair and the pups. Their unique yips, whines, bark and howls make the coyote vocal range very distinct.
• Coyote’s are intelligent, but are generally very timid towards humans. Taking advantage to maintain populations, coyotes will often breed with domestic dogs creating hybrid crosses that tend to invade urban and rural areas due to the lack of fear.

Diet:

• The coyote is a great carnivore feeding mostly on small animals, mice, voles, squirrels, hares, and birds but have been known to hunt deer. Carrion, eggs, and berries are also an integral part of their diet.
• In Ontario they mostly form a family pack and they hunt as a unit.
  

 

Habitat:

• Due to the decreasing wolf population, the coyote has flourished and thrived moving across North America over the last century.
  With the ability to adapt adversely, they can be found in mixed forests, prairies, and mountainous regions. Coyotes are not uncommon in city areas, ravines and agricultural lands, as they are adapting to human development.

Reproduction:

• Mating occurs between late January -March. The same pair may mate for consecutive years but not often mate for life.
• A litter of 3-10 pups are born in late April or early May in a dug out burrow or den. The dens are usually burrowed into slopes; enlarged abandoned groundhogs holes, hollow tree trunk or dense brush piles.
• Their eyes open at 10 days old and at 3-4 weeks old they start to leave the den with the mother. This promotes social interactions though fighting and wrestling among siblings to establish dominance and social position.

Native Notes:
“ The great sacred “medicine dog’ of the plains; among other tribes. He has great magical powers, but they do not always work in his favor. His own folly sometime fools him. In the folly of his acts we see our own foolishness. He often cannot see the forest for the trees, or until the tree is lying on top of him and wonders how it got there? Coyote medicine helps humans to “lighten up” when the world becomes too serious. Remember, if humans cannot take ownership for their faults and laugh at themselves, then living in a good way is lost; humor is half the battle. Coyote is a much misunderstood cultural hero.”