Fifty Coyotes in Seattle

Carnivores in our midst

The other day while walking up to the Light Rail station at Northgate, I heard a wonderful sound. Fifty feet further I saw the source, a lone coyote standing atop a high spot at North Seattle College. He or she was clearly agitated by a pair of dogs and their people on the grass just north. As I stood there watching, the coyote continued to bark, or yip, as well as howl. It was a glorious way to begin my day. (Below is a video. It’s only 19 seconds. Sorry for the first few chaotic seconds.)

This is not the first time I have seen coyotes around Seattle. I have seen them under I-5 on Ravenna, at the college, and once, I encountered three of them sitting in the middle of an intersection on a quiet road. They didn’t seem to care that I was running by them. I wondered if they would have moved when a car arrived; they certainly seemed to own the road.

I am always pleased when I see an urban coyote, knowing that they, both the individual and species, are survivors, who have adapted to the world’s number one predator—humans. The U.S. government, via a variety of agencies, has killed multiple millions of coyotes, prompted by concerns that they were vicious predators, which if left uncontrolled, would wreak havoc on an epic scale. (A study of media accounts of urban coyotes in Canada noted that coyotes were regularly portrayed as brazen, violent, menacing attackers that terrorized, ravaged, and feasted on urban pets.) As recently as 2021, the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service intentionally killed on average 7.3 coyotes every single hour of the year.

And, yet coyotes have survived and even thrived. Ironically, one response to humanity’s war on them is that coyotes increase the number of pups they have, which means more survive to head out and move into new territory. Another reason for the spread of coyotes is that they are great teachers with parents instructing their young on where, when, and how to find food; adults also pass on a wariness and cleverness developed through generations of being persecuted. In addition, they are monogamous and mate for life.

Coyotes are curious, which can be problematic when they are probing the edges of their territory and come into contact with our territories, or what we like to call our yards. As Senior Conservation Scientist at the Woodland Park Zoo Robert Long says, this has perhaps led to a myth that coyotes lure urban pets into the woods, where a pack is waiting to attack. Such an idea is completely unfounded says Dr. Long, and is more a reflection of our perceptions and how humans tend to project human traits onto animals. When a pet appears, the coyote will most often retreat to get away from a perceived threat. Unfortunately, the dog may pursue the coyote, which may end up poorly for the dog, if he/she runs into the coyote’s protective family.

As Long regularly points out when talking and writing about coyotes, our view of them is based more on myth than on reality. Coyotes are relatively small (about 20-30 pounds), do not kill people (dogs kill 35 people/year), do not live in packs, and are rarely aggressive. More often, and not surprisingly, we create the problems by leaving food out, feeding them, overeacting, and letting out pets off leash.

Coyotes reported to Carnivore Spotter (one years)

We do not know how many coyotes live in Seattle but given the number of sightings, it seems that quite a few share our cityscape with us. In August 2019, the Woodland Park Zoo started its Carnivore Spotter program, where you can send in your reports of seeing urban carnivores. There were more than 4,200 reports in the first year. About 50 percent were coyotes. Others, in order of number of reports, were raccoon, bobcat, black bear, river otter, opossum, mountain lion, and red fox. Coyote were seen throughout the day (which is normal) and across the city, with the highest numbers north of the Ship Canal. Like people, coyotes eat pretty much anything, favoring rodents and rabbits, fruit (apples and cherries), insects, and the occasional domestic pet.

Coyotes reaffirm for me a central truth that humans, even ones living in dense urban settings, cannot separate ourselves from the natural world around us. Whether it’s weather, migrating geese, morning birdsong, or tides, or encounters with mundane species, such as rats, pigeons, gulls, and cockroaches, wildness permeates our urban spaces and plays a role in our daily existence. This not only brings me hope that we will never banish nature but also makes my life more enjoyable and interesting, and for that I rejoice. Yay coyotes!

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Word of the Week - Coyote - According to Dan Flores’ Coyote America, the term coyote, or collote, first appeared in Albert Pikes’ Narratives of Two Journeys in the Prairie. (Pike used the Spanish double ll, pronounced as y.) Before then, many in the United States called them prairie wolves. The term coyote derives from coyotl from Nahuatl, an Aztecan language. Nineteenth century Spanish speakers pronounced coyote coy-YOH-tay, accenting the second syllable. You may also hear ky-YOTE.