MOUNTAIN LIFE - Blue Mountains | Winter 2019

102 ML BLUE WINTER 2019 only to wolves but after coyotes were confirmed in the province in 1919 the law was amended so that it applied to them as well. After the provincial bounty was repealed, some counties and municipalities maintained their own bounties on coyotes into the early 1980s but those too were stopped and bounties have been illegal in Ontario for over 30 years. During the bounty, most wolves and coyotes were hunted and trapped; use of poison for such purposes has been illegal in Ontario for many decades.” However, not only humans have persecuted the coyote. In his book Coyote America , Dan Flores writes of how the continual harassment of the coyote by the grey wolf, its evolutionary cousin, played an important role in the coyote’s ability to adapt and thrive. It’s an incredible story of survival; somehow the clever coyote has outwitted both human and animal alike. Why has the coyote been so successful while populations of other mammals have declined or been driven to extinction? Simply stated, coyotes are a product of their environment and available resources. “Coyotes can occupy a wide breadth of ecological niches and can adapt to eat anything that is remotely edible,” explains Brent Patterson. “This is their main advantage over other species.” As an opportunistic omnivore, they enjoy a diversity of foods including small rodents, rabbits, fruit, vegetables and carrion. “Coyotes can travel through all sorts of terrain and habitat types and are highly tolerant of humans, especially in urban areas,” Patterson adds. So how do we co-exist with coyotes? “It’s a matter of education,” says Patterson. “There’s lots of misinformation out there about the lives of coyotes. It’s also an issue of minimizing food sources. They are very food-driven, and nuisance coyotes generally become that way because of an easy food source causing them to associate people with food.” Coyote aggression, although rare, has been reported in parts of southern Ontario. Common triggers for aggressive behaviour include competition for and lack of food, threats to their pups and dens, or an injured or ill animal. In the unlikely event that you find yourself in a standoff with an aggressive coyote there are simple and effective hazing techniques you can use. Yell in a firm voice, wave your arms, make noise or throw something towards (not at) the animal. Never run from a coyote, or any canine for that matter, and always leave them an escape route out of the area. The distinct lines that we believe define the boundaries of wildlands, rural, suburban and urban areas are blended into a landscape mosaic for the roaming coyote. There’s no single answer for how we might peacefully co-exist. Other than just that: we need to learn to co- exist. Despite our best efforts to impose ourselves on the top of the ecological pyramid, the coyote has outplayed and outwitted us all. DIY: Enter “coyote” into the search field on ontario.ca for resources on how to co-exist with Canis latrans . Coyotes can occupy a wide breadth of ecological niches and can adapt to eat anything that is remotely edible.