dave1949
Super Star Member
The farmer I mentioned made a substantial financial loss due to coyotes.
In Michigan, coyotes are a "game" species. There is a specific season to hunt them, including a short night hunting season. You have to buy a small game license. There are several months of the year when they are off limits. Only farmers and "designated representatives" are permitted to shoot them year round on private property "when doing or about to do damage". The fact is that with them being mainly nocturnal and a ban on nocturnal hunting for most of the year and on top of that a rimfire only restriction at night, and it has to be clear that no amount of legal hunting is ever going to make a dent in their population. The only thing one can hope to achieve is to discourage them re-entering the property after their first encounter with you.
Dealing with these predators is very labor intensive. Trapping cannot be used in the presence of livestock without causing a lot of collateral damage. In residential areas, liberal town councils have enacted shooting prohibitions. I actually have a bigger coyote problem in my neighborhood than the farmer currently has. I have to escort my dogs when they go outside at night since we now regularly see coyotes within a short distance of homes. Frankly, these liberal tree hugging laws and predators are on a collision course. People are going to start dying and already the attacks in California are on the rise (the most liberal of states). When that has gone too far, then I imagine we will start seeing them being shot from helicopters like they do in Texas, except it will all be gov employees.
Man has always put predators in their place and made sure they understood they were not welcome near people or domestic animals. That is really all that we need. I don't care what the coyote does in the woods as long as the livestock are safe, as well as our kids and domestic animals. If the coyotes cross the line and venture into our space, they either need to die or learn not to come back.
That works until all, or essentially all, the space is "our space." Then what? Do we eliminate species? By the way, without liberals, there wouldn't be much that's wild and clean left in this country. For that, you should be thankful.
I can see deterring/teaching avoidance to coyotes, or killing when needed, to protect vulnerable farm animals, but we need to be looking ahead at some sort of wildlife planned areas that preserve species too.
I have coyotes around and they have not eliminated the deer by any means, so I agree with the earlier post that said killing coyotes to improve the deer hunter's chances is nonsense and no way to manage wildlife. Coyotes are non-native here. They moved in after wolves were eliminated. Still, they serve a very useful role in nature here as a predator. As far as I know, without highly managed hunting, it isn't possible to have a healthy and normal herbivore population without predators.