Biologists expect more coyotes to rear heads on island


A coyote stops to take a glance March 23 while trotting in a backyard along the East Passage. The collar around its neck is a GPS device that allows the Narragansett Bay Coyote Study to track its movement. The animal was trapped at Watson Farm. PHOTO BY MARYSE POIRIER

A coyote stops to take a glance March 23 while trotting in a backyard along the East Passage. The collar around its neck is a GPS device that allows the Narragansett Bay Coyote Study to track its movement. The animal was trapped at Watson Farm. PHOTO BY MARYSE POIRIER

With the onset of spring, state environmental officials are reminding Rhode Island residents they are likely to see an increase in coyotes as the canines begin to search for food for their litters.

This especially is true in Jamestown as photos of coyotes in residential areas continue to be posted on Facebook on a weekly basis. To combat these interactions, homeowners should remove any potential food sources from their properties.

Coyotes, according to biologist Chris Brown at the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management, are keenly intelligent, extraordinarily adaptable and willing to eat almost any available food. That includes small mammals, birds, insects, fruits, garbage, cat food, birdseed and compost. The key to minimizing interactions and conflicts with coyotes is reducing food sources available to them around our homes and neighborhoods. Coyotes that rely on natural food sources remain wild and wary of humans. Feeding these animals, however, makes them less fearful, and they can become casual when encountering humans. Feeding wildlife became illegal in Jamestown in 2016.

“If you see coyotes that are bold and brazen, it’s often directly related to intentional feeding or easy and reliably available food sources associated with human activities,” Brown said. “Intentionally feeding wild animals habituates them, causes them to lose their inherent fear of humans, and may lead to brazen behavior. It also leads to a whole series of problems, including frequenting areas close to homes and preying on domestic animals such as chickens, cats and small dogs.”

According to Brown, adult coyotes typically breed in late winter and the female gives birth to a litter of 4-8 pups in April. Consisting of the adult pair and the pups, this social unit will be maintained until the pups become yearlings and disperse on their own or get booted out by their parents. Noisy, hungry pups must be fed. That means adult coyotes will be seen and heard foraging and hunting for food in rural, suburban and even urban neighborhoods over the next several months. As daylight hours increase, adult coyotes may spend more time actively foraging during daytime than they would at other times of the year.

Brown said coyotes play an important ecological role by controlling populations of rodents, geese and white-tailed deer. Shy and elusive by nature, most coyotes usually make every attempt to avoid interactions with humans, and attacks on people are very rare. On the other hand, more than 4.5 million people are bitten by dogs each year in the United States and more than half of dog bite injuries occur at home with dogs familiar to us. More than 800,000 receive medical attention for dog bites, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Homeowners are asked to chase coyotes off their properties. Coyotes can be kept in the wild by “hazing” them, which means doing things to scare them or chase them away. According to the website CoyoteSmarts, the following actions are effective hazing tactics:

Be as big and loud as possible. Do not run or turn your
back.
Wave your arms, clap your
hands and shout in an authoritative voice.
Make noise by banging pots
and pans or using an air horn or
whistle.
Throw small stones, sticks
or tennis balls.
Shake or throw a “coyote
shaker,” which is a soda can
filled with nuts, bolts, pennies or
pebbles sealed with duct tape.

Pets, particularly cats, should be left indoors. Coyotes don’t distinguish between domestic and wild animals and are likely to view cats and small dogs as potential food. Larger dogs are viewed as competition. There have been a least a dozen reports of local household pets being killed by coyotes since 2015.

When confronted by a coyote, residents should stand up to look big, wave their arms and yell loudly. Keeping an assertive posture and making eye contact will convey a message of authority that coyotes will typically respect.

Adult female coyotes typically weigh 33-40 pounds, while males typically weigh 34-47 pounds. They often look heavier because of their thick fur. The first appearance of coyotes in Rhode Island occurred in the mid-1960s, part of a range expansion into the eastern United States that began at the end of the 19th century. Coyotes can currently be found in all Rhode Island communities except New Shoreham. They may hunt and travel alone, or sometimes will travel as a group, usually an adult pair with their offspring from the most recent litter. In Rhode Island, coyotes are mostly nocturnal, mainly to avoid interactions with people. They remain active year-round and do not hibernate. Coyote pairs are territorial and will exclude other coyotes from their established territory.

“Coyotes are now well established as part of our native fauna and unless you live on Block Island, you can expect that coyotes occur in your town or neighborhood and at some point, you may actually see one in your yard, on the bike path, or crossing a farm field,” Brown said. “Not all coyotes exhibit bad traits and those that do have likely been encouraged or conditioned to behave that way because of human behavior.”