Coyotes In the Streets and On the Mind

   This article can be found at http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/28/science/28coyotes.html?pagewanted=1&ref=science

   Coyotes are fascinating. Plain and simple. Most people will eat up a story at the head of the Science section in the Times titled “Mysteries That Howl and Hunt” with the lead bit “Despite coyotes’ growing urban presence, we have trouble understanding them, counting them—even defining them.” Add to that a wonderful illustration of a cat, some berries, and a beetle all stuffed between the jaws of a devious-looking coyote—how can anyone resist reading this one?
    The story, written by Carol Kaesuk Yoon, strikes a nice balance between scientific information and intrigue. She begins with the fascination behind the animal: its “howls and yips,” the cultural legends the beast inflames, Mark Twain’s description of the coyote as “a living, breathing allegory of Want,” and, of course, the beloved Wile E. Coyote. Then she talks about the mysterious science of the coyote: how they have done so well to populate all kinds of habitats, including urban, yet we rarely see them and know little about them. She especially focuses on the Eastern coyotes, which seem to have reproduced with not just wolves in their territory, but also domestic dogs. This is one of the big finds actually—that these species, members of the same genus Canis, can actually mate with each other and produce perfectly normal offspring. Their indiscriminate diet may also be a factor in their adaptability to new environments.
    Yoon finishes off the piece with some astonishing anecdotes that some may not have known: “coyotes strolling in Central Park, trotting into a Quiznos restaurant in downtown Chicago and taking a dash around a federal courthouse in Detroit;” one scientist’s estimate of 2,000 coyotes in the Chicago metropolitan area; researchers claim that a person is “much more likely to be injured or even killed by a domestic dog” than a coyote. The last paragraph is quite poetic – “those calls…bounce along canyons of rock or concrete or just down the cul-de-sac. The coyote is saying to everyone…‘We are here’”—a nice finishing touch to a winning piece.