Myths & Truths About Coyotes: What You Need to Know About America's Most Misunderstood Predator

by Carol Cartaino

Overview

Once just a colorful character in children’s cartoons or accounts of the Old West, coyotes are now real-life neighbors to nearly every one of us. Coyotes can be found in every U.S. state except Hawaii, and they make themselves at home in suburbs and cities, as well as the countryside. Most of us have heard or read stories or watched TV accounts of coyote problems across the country, and many of us have heard the howls of a coyote pack somewhere just beyond our sight.

The spread of the intelligent, adaptable, and opportunistic coyote across America is one of the biggest wildlife success stories of recent years—but not everyone is happy about it. Parents worry that their children might be attacked by a coyote in the backyard or a nearby field or park. Pet owners have the same concern about their cats and dogs. Sheep and cattle farmers, and even fruit growers, have long been up in arms about losses to coyotes. And the list goes on. . . .

As with any topic about which little is known and much is feared or suspected, bring up the subject of coyotes, and myths and half-truths fly. These myths and misunderstandings are rooted partly in the actual habits and activities of coyotes and partly in our fear of and fascination with them. Myths & Truths About Coyotes gives every reader an interesting course in Coyote 101—deflating the myths, illuminating and sharing the truths, and delivering a few surprises along the way.

“Brilliant! In Myths & Truths About Coyotes, Carol Cartaino has managed to do the near impossible. She’s given us impartial insight into coyotes’ existence and tapped into every aspect of their lives. Whether you love coyotes or hate them, we must all learn to live with them. Carol has given us a gift in showing some of the best ways to do so.”
—John H. Williams, wildlife biologist and author of Deer Hunter’s Field Guide: Pursuing Michigan’s Whitetails

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780897326940
Publisher:	Menasha Ridge Press
Publication date:	11/01/2010
Pages:	200
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.40(h) x 0.60(d)

About the Author

Carol Cartaino, a native of New Jersey and graduate of Rutgers University(major in English and minor in biology), has had a lifetime interest in animals and the outdoors. Growing up, she had just about every pet animal known and walked home from the library every week with armloads of books on wild animals. All of her best time as a child was spent in the woods near home or on her grandparents’ farm in Western Pennsylvania. As an adult she has spent many happy hours hiking, camping, fishing, kayaking, and engaging in outdoor photography and nature study. For the past 40 years, Carol has been a professional book editor and writer’s collaborator, working on almost every subject imaginable within nonfiction, with a strong emphasis on how-to, self-help, and reference. She has helped many authors—from the editors of “Field & Stream” and “Arizona Highways” to scuba divers, photographers, plastic surgeons, veterinarians, and experts on moonshine and cookery—to produce satisfying books. In her ten years as an editor in the Trade Division of Prentice-Hall, Inc., books on nature and gardening were among her specialties. In the decade that followed she was editor-in-chief of Writer’s Digest Books in Cincinnati. In the years since, she has been a freelance editor and book doctor for literary agents, publishers, and individual authors. Since 1980, Carol has also served as editor and collaborator for best-selling author Don Aslett, whose books have sold a total of more than three million copies. Carol lives with her son and many pets on a 66-acre farm in Southern Ohio, on which she can continue her nature study and listen to the coyote songs.

Read an Excerpt

What do coyotes actually do all day? Am I more likely to see them in the daytime or at night?

To answer this question, we have to take “day” in its larger sense—that is, a 24-hour period. In their original prairie homes before European settlers arrived in this country, coyotes traveled about a great deal in the daytime. They still do, in undeveloped areas, wildlands, and anywhere they feel comfortable and unthreatened. And we may see them abroad in daylight almost anywhere, even now, during the pup-raising season, when both parents have to do a great deal of hunting to keep all of those little mouths fed. Young coyotes, such as half-grown pups, are very likely to be active during the day, as well.

However, for the most part, the more people who inhabit an area, the more nocturnal coyotes are there. Thus urban and suburban coyotes are more nocturnal than rural ones, though they may alter this pattern to take advantage of special circumstances they become aware of, such as someone faithfully pouring out big bowls of dog or cat food during the day.

In summer, coyotes are even more likely to be night hunters, since hot midday is not the best time to be moving around in a warm fur coat, and at this time of year, prey and fruits and vegetables, too, are plentiful. In winter, when food is much harder to come by, coyotes may be forced to do some daytime hunting just to stay alive.

Sunrise, sunset . . .
Even when coyotes are largely nocturnal, their all-time most active periods are when day eases into night, and vice versa. This means twilight and daybreak. As many of their prey species—many of them nocturnal too— are setting out for their night’s hunting or grazing, or winding down before the next day’s rest, the coyotes are out there, paying close attention.

The ghost on the move
In general, whenever human activity slows or stops, coyotes creep out and do their thing. Except for the brief period each year devoted to mating, this largely means prospecting for food. In one form or another, this is what occupies most of a coyote’s waking hours. In the nightly (or daily) quest to fill their bellies, coyotes follow game trails, livestock trails, human trails, dirt roads, other roads, train tracks, and power-line corridors. Just like us, they prefer the path of least resistance, whatever route will take them where they are headed the most direct and easiest way. They usually take the “back way” into places, traveling in the spots few people look at or pay attention to, such as the edges or back of things and in gullies, washes, and the like. If you have ever taken a train trip, you have seen how many parts of our everyday environment we are scarcely aware of, but they are there. Urban coyotes, especially, cross many a road in their forays, and the speed with which they do this can be awe-inspiring.

When just exploring for possibilities, they move at a trot, or quick shuffle. When they feel safe from observation or interference, they dart into farm fields and backyards, survey picnic areas and roadsides, many a place they would never venture to in the full light of day.

Naptime
When the time comes for a coyote to sleep, he often does so at midday, or the hottest part of a day. His “bedroom” is some protected area, usually one with good visibility. He doesn’t need an actual shelter of any kind, even in the winter, just some thick brush, a fencerow, thicket, pile of rocks or uprooted trees, or field of tall grass or weeds, or grain, that he can curl up amidst. In urban areas, he may even consider an abandoned building. But the ever-cautious coyote, even in captivity, usually prefers not to be enclosed in any way during his naptimes. Coyotes only use burrows, holes, or caves in denning time, or the most violent weather.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

About the Authors

Introduction

A Quick Perspective on Coyotes

Coyotes Up Close

A Look at Coyote Society

The Country Coyote

The City Coyote

Coyote Control: Ways of Discouraging Coyotes

When Coyotes Must Go: Trapping and hunting Coyotes

A Few Last Facts About Coyotes

Parting Thoughts

Recommended Reading

Index

Editorial Reviews

"Carol Cartaino gives a well-balanced account of coyotes, their life history and their controversial interactions with humans." —Ohio's Country Living Magazine, October 2012

"Pet owners would be wise to read this book" — Janice Lloyd, Pet Blogger for USA Today

"Whether you love coyotes or hate them, we must all learn how to live with them, and Carol has given us a gift in showing some of the best ways to do so." — John H. Williams, wildlife biologist, and author of Deer Hunter's Field Guide: Pursuing Michigan's Whitetail

"By detailing the coyote's natural history and behavior, this book provides good practical advice on how to better enable us to coexist and adapt to living with these cunning and cool creatures." — Jonathan Way Ph.D., author of Suburban Howls: Tracking the Eastern Coyote in Urban Massachusetts

"Most people enjoy studying animals at the local zoo. Carol tracks them in her back fields. She's a born naturalist with a deep interest in wildlife as well as a lifelong love of animals of any kind." — Robert T. Sharp, D.V.M, author of No Dogs in Heaven? Scenes from the Life of a Country Veterinarian, and monthly columnist ("Ask a Country Vet") for Country Living Magazine

"Myths and Truths About Coyotes is a well-researched, factual account of the coyote's natural history, population status and relationship with humans." — Arizona Wildlife Views, September 2011

From the Publisher