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| Echo Lake coyote Photo by Claudia Meadows |
Yearling coyotes stay with their parents for a year, helping to take care of the new pups, which are born in the spring. The next spring, the new pups are ready to do their year of helping the family and the litter of old pups, now adolescents, go out to find their own way in the world.
What we are seeing now are all these older coyotes trying to establish their own territory.
There do seem to be more of them every year. I lived in Shoreline for 15 years before I even knew there were coyotes around us. And now I realize that I lost two cats to them because I didn't know.
I've collected a fair amount of information about coyotes. What I now realize is that every green space, no matter how small, has a coyote den.
I also know that this coyote is a littermate to the one that was sleeping in my front yard!
--Diane Hettrick
Eye-catching photo! And thank you for this informative post. Let me just say here, as a cat lover whose two kitties are 100% indoors, please keep your cats inside at all times, folks! Better for the cats, and better for our wild birds, which are being decimated by domestic cats. Domestic cats aren't native to North America, and the wild birds haven't evolved to protect themselves from cats.
ReplyDeleteI haven't seen any babies this year. Usually my yard is a play area but I've only seen one or two adults. Hopefully we'll get a litter next year. A couple of years ago I had 7 babies and three adults running around at once.
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