Photo by Dru Bloomfield.
As summer comes to an end, coyote sightings are sure to rise, according to wildlife expert Rebecca Dmytryk.
“This is the time juvenile coyotes will start dispersing from their home territories,” Dmytryk said. “It’s also the leanest time of year, when prey is scarce, which may force coyotes deeper into urban areas in search of food.”
In August 2015, residents of Long Beach and its surrounding areas attended a workshop presented by Dmytryk as a response to a demand for protection both from and for urban coyotes. Reaction and solutions both lethal and nonlethal were fueled by emotionally charged social-media posts and pages and arguments from both sides that were exchanged for hours at city council meetings. During her workshop, Dmytrk described non-lethal solutions for protection, and this year, with a potential increase in coyote encounters, she hopes to test some of these methods of dealing with the smart, adaptable creatures. In particular, she’s looking for property owners who have recently had repeated encounters with a coyote or have lost a pet to a coyote and for hobby-farmers who might want help protecting their animals.
“While I will always be okay with removing an individual coyote that has injured a human, the indiscriminate killing of coyotes in response to them taking pets or livestock has got to stop— it just does not work,” she said. “Non-lethal control measures can and do work; we just need to be able to prove it to skeptics, and we need data to show communities they have options.”
Wildlife Emergency Services, a Bay-area all-volunteer team of wildlife first responders, initiated the study in 2015. The study is called the Coyote Challenge, and the team has raised funds specifically for this research. Methods include covering the cost of deterrents such as building predator-proof enclosures, constructing a coyote-proof fence, or strategically placing deterrents to keep coyotes away. The study is open to California residents who live between the San Francisco Bay area and Orange County, and there is no charge to participants.
Dmytryk, who is a member of Wild Life Emergency Systems and also operates a pest-control company, holds that killing nuisance coyotes doesn’t work and can actually cause a spike in the coyote population where the packs are being disturbed. The right non-lethal controls can result in long-term relief, she says.
“There’s some research going on to test non-lethal controls, but I find many of these studies fail to test the controls on offending animals,” Dmyktryk said. “To actually prove these methods work, you have to test them on coyotes that are acting badly. That’s why we’re asking for help from people who are actually experiencing issues with problem coyotes.”
The group wants to get the study started immediately in view of the impending coyote season.
“I see this as a win-win,” Dmytryk said. “We get to test our methods and participants have their coyote problems resolved, for good.”
Anyone interested in participating is asked to email Dmytryk at [email protected].
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