This IS a coyote, right?

[poultryman17]

yep, definately a coyote! i see them every year when deer hunting. No mistake about

 

[PDXcluck]

Eastern Coyotes are genetically different (and visibly so) than their western counterparts. It's been proven that they have interbred with wolves in Canada before they expanded southward into the US. It's why our eastern 'yotes look so big.

This I had not heard, and is very interesting. I am from northern MN and rarely, if ever, saw coywolves (though I am pretty sure I saw at least one). Although I did see many coyotes and many wolves.

I aim to read up on this tidbit regarding the entirety of the Eastern Coyote species (or subspecies) being coyote/wolf crosses. Thanks for the info!

 

[brandislee]

FWIW, a coyote that pretty and non-mangy if you shoot or trap it you can sell the pelt pretty easily. If you want to skin it, that is. My brother in law (who is 19, btw, and has like four avenues of income- he raises show pigs, traps to sell pelts, and gets rid of pack rat nests for people in addition to full time college, livestock judging, and farming in the summer... one of those types who you can't fathom how they get it all done... anyway...) traps and hunts racoons and coyotes in Northern Kansas. Coyote fur is actually really beautiful and soft as long as it's not mangy.

I'm normally pretty conservationist about predators, but the others are right- once a coyote finds out you have an easy source of food for them they keep coming back. My dad even looses calves to them sometimes.

 

[MonsterMom]

Hi MonsterMom,

I'm in Ontario Canada and we have lots of the up here. And they're that big. He's well fed and not mangy at all but he's definitely a coyote!

Amazing! I've only ever seen the skinny little ones that squeeze through fence bars and steal dog food, or the occasional unfortunate cat. I guess that's what we get for trying to build homes so close to their homes.

 

[Birdo]

That was a great book! But, it was about Wolves, not Coyotes.

Hmm...I wonder which book you're thinking of. Prodigal Summer focuses around three different groups of people, one of whom is named Deanna Wolfe She's a forest ranger who tracks a den of coyotes in southern Appalachia. She suspected that they were moving further east to fill the gap left by the red wolf 200 years ago.

But interestingly, Kingsolver speculates in the book that those red wolves may have actually been a coyote/grey wolf hybrid, and the coyotes out here resemble them quite a bit. Which ties in to what others here are saying about the two mixing. Interesting stuff.