It's not a new sporting team; have you heard anything about the Chicago coyotes?

There was a recent discussion about the coy wolf and his superpowers on Facebook. Those of us participating were in rural areas however.

I’ve seen coyotes on a couple of occasions around Chicago. One was leading several police cars on a slow-speed chase through the streets of my neighborhood. There are tons of rabbits to keep them well fed.

Most cities are crawling with food for coyotes, squirrels, rabbits, rodents, small pets. Why wouldn’t they follow the food?

There are quite a few coyotes in Golden Gate Park and elsewhere in San Francisco.

I am in Western NY and over the past few days have been photographing (with a stealth, motion sensitive trail camera) the activities of a coywolf as it took apart and dragged a deer carcass. I measured it as 26 inches tall at the shoulder and estimate it at 50 pounds. They are much bigger than a coyote.

About a week ago we had about a foot of snow and the temperature was far below freezing yet one deer was taken and dragged to a spot on my property. I saw blood in the snow and followed it to the carcass. I set up the camera and waited. Each morning I’d download the pictures and see what animals visited. It was quite a show. The coywolf had no trouble yanking the deer around and pulling it hundreds of feet through the snow.
(If they can take down a fit and healthy deer they can take down someone wandering around in a snow suit and boots. It is a bit horrifying to think those things are out in my woods.)

I saw a piece on it this morning on the Today Show. They said they put tracking devices on the coyotes and not only are there a lot of them in Chicago, but they are nocturnal, which is not typical for them but they do it to keep away from humans.

“Have you seen or heard of any urban wildlife?”

Yes.

@jca “they are nocturnal, which is not typical for them”

I’m not sure I agree with that; I think this is a normal behaviour for the species. They will hunt in the day in the wild, but also at night. And when I’ve encountered them in packs in an urban setting, it has always been at night.

The ones in this neighborhood only visited at night. My stealth camera took many hundreds of night shots but only 2 pictures during the day – and that was of a hawk that was picking at the carcass.

My husband and I lived in a little suburb just south of Peoria, IL that is included in the Peoria Metropolitan Statistical Area. We had a pack of coyote that lived in the woods behind our house. We would often hear them at night and they would run through the yards on our street. There were a few times when we noticed them during the day, but that was usually a mom calling for her pup.

We now live in rural Illinois and we hear coyotes all the time in the evening. I just heard them last night when I took the dogs out for their final pee of the evening. There’s no shortage of population.

@jonsblond I really miss hearing them yipping when things get quiet at night. It’s such a wild sound.

There are coyotes in some parts of Seattle.

I never saw coyotes in Chicago, but certainly rats, giant insects, and other strange swamp/sewer beasts.

That’s cool, thanks, I had not seen the Coyote-Cam.

I’ve seen a Chicago coyote (for the locals, it was on Kingsbury, by the river, near Best Buy and Binny’s).

Also possums. We had a hawk in my neighborhood last year for a while. A few times I’ve spotted some kind of egrets or herons along the river in Ravenswood Manor. Bats are easy to find in the parks.

Raccoons have become a nuisance in the harbors – they raid the boats! Here’s a family I spotted on my bike ride home one evening.

@dappled_leaves: I don’t doubt what you’re saying. I was just repeating what they said on the show.

For all – here’s the article and video from the show:
http://www.nbcchicago.com/news/local/chicago-coyotes-289187901.html

@jca Yup, I realized that from what you said. I was disputing what they said.

They made the news last night. Beautiful animals, but I don’t want to face off with them. We get packs running right through the lawn, the noise is cool.

@Adirondackwannabe They’re not going to attack an adult human. I’d watch children closely, though.

@dappled_leaves That’s the theory. I’m not going to put it to a test. The packs are taking adult deer. I doubt a human is beyond their reach.

@Adirondackwannabe Okey dokey. But I’m willing to bet there are all kinds of things you “put to a test” on a daily basis (say, crossing the street or driving a car) that actually have some documented risk attached. Unlike “facing off” coyotes, whatever that means.

@jonsblond I’m thinking they have made a resurgence in the past 50 years. When I was growing up in then-rural parts of North-Central Illinois (Kankakee, Dwight, Ottawa), I don’t remember there being any population of coyote in the region. I do remember hearing about packs of feral dogs.