What kind of animals do coyotes eat

Coyotes are easily able to navigate urban landscapes and have filled the hole created in the ecosystem. There are plenty of natural food sources provided in urban settings such as rodents and rabbits. While coyotes passing through our areas are quite common, removing an active food source is one of the necessary components in keeping them at an ideal distance from humans. Available food — either intentional or unintentional — will attract many other wildlife species including coyotes and make them more comfortable around people.

Coyotes are omnivores: they eat small rodents as well as local vegetation berries, fruits, nuts. While they may not distinguish between a cat or one of their preferred prey species such as rabbits or voles , they do not utilize domestic dogs as a common food source.

A study in Chicago — and another in Canada — indicated that less than two per cent of their food source was domestic animals and it was undetermined whether the scat analysis included carrion — animals that had already died.

Coyotes are extremely curious and intelligent animals — they often watch the events happening around them, just as a tourist in a new city would. Young coyotes are immature and very puppy-like: children and the toys they play with like balls can lead a juvenile coyote into play behaviour.

Never turn your back on any dog- domestic or wild and run. Maintain direct eye contact, use strong verbal cues such as yelling no screaming and slowly back away. A coyote will not see a human as potential food — considering their usual prey is a mouse, vole or fallen crab apple. However, like any other species of canid including your pet dog , they may chase something that runs from them. When a coyote has been food-conditioned, meaning people have directly fed a particular coyote, they may not immediately move away from an area when aversion conditioning is deployed.

It is critical to send consistent, firm messaging through voice and body gestures, that the coyote is not welcome. See ' Keeping Coyotes Away ' for more helpful tips. Though we — residents — see the city as separate from nature, it has a thriving ecosystem that includes not only ravines and parks but streets, backyards, industrial parks, and construction sites.

The species was originally only found in the prairies and deserts of central and western North America. Humans helped facilitate their expansion in the s both by creating more open habitats through logging and agricultural development, and also hunting out wolves and cougars , which are natural coyote competitors, Live Science previously reported.

As humans took over more and more countryside, coyotes adapted to live in cities. Today, coyote populations are thriving in big cities from Los Angeles to New York. Coyotes are not picky eaters. They hunt and eat small prey, such as rodents, rabbits and squirrels, as well as insects and fruit, depending on what is available to them.

Coyotes can also work together to kill deer, according to the Atlanta Coyote Project. Opportunistic coyotes will take advantage of pet food, garbage and other food left out by humans, especially in urban environments.

They have also been known to hunt livestock and human pets, such as dogs and cats. Related: Urban coyotes could set the stage for larger predators in cities.

Predatory coyotes can still become prey themselves. Cougars, wolves, grizzly bears and black bears are known to kill coyotes, according to the U. Department of Agriculture Forest Service. Golden eagles have been known to swoop down and take young coyotes. Humans kill coyotes too, for their fur and in attempts to control their populations.

Coyotes generally avoid people, but occasionally they will attack. In a few cases, coyotes have learned to associate humans with food in urban environments, making them bolder around people. Related: Why are there so many coyotes in cities? There were coyote attacks on humans between and in the U. These attacks were largely in urban and suburban environments. Only two of the attacks were fatal. The most effective way for humans to prevent coyote attacks is to avoid feeding them directly or indirectly, according to the Cook County Coyote Project in Illinois.

The project also advises people to not let their pets run loose and to keep their yards secured. During a coyote encounter, the project recommends that people try to scare the animal away. However, if a coyote is trying to avoid people, then humans should not deliberately aggravate it.

Coyotes typically hunt alone or in pairs unless they are working together to kill deer. Spring and summer is when they're helping provide food for pups, so almost anything is possible. Protein, most likely, to help their young grow stronger. Mice and voles, squirrels, grasshoppers, young birds and emerging plants with berries all are possibilities. Around ponds or lakes, they'll nab fish that get washed on banks in floods, baby ducks or shorebirds. One lake I fish occasionally is overpopulated with stunted crappie, which are not beneficial for smaller lakes or ponds.

They reproduce prolifically and eat other things bass and bluegills feed on, as well as bass and bluegill fry. So whenever I catch a crappie, I toss it on the bank. It doesn't last more than a day or two, thanks to coyotes or other fish-eating animals. Once late summer and autumn arrive, other wildlife have bred and had their young. Rabbits, squirrels, turkeys, deer, feral pigs and just about anything else they can catch is a possibility.

Even grasshoppers. Whitetail fawns are a heavy target whether your deer population is high or low. The Quality Deer Management Association revealed a multi-state study showing fawns are hit hard by coyotes.

Songdogs also will scavenge dead animals, too, including roadkill whitetails. The study didn't differentiate between the two, although via hair diameter analysis it showed that adult deer showed up in scat year-round and fawns hair in about seven months of the year.