Life on the Watershed: Just a “Normal Wildlife Sighting”

It is one of the most social--and adaptable--of mammals. 

Coyotes now occupy almost any Bay Area open space, rural and urban. Wherever  one settles, it’s normally wary of humans and tends to stay out of sight. Still, watershed keeper Sarah Lenz captured this Peninsula Watershed resident on camera.  



Wildlife here may be less fearful of humans because of the absence of the human pressures, she says. “But I believe they always know where we are. This was just a normal wildlife sighting on the Watershed.” 

These days, litters of recently born pups have expanded the population. Not all will make it to adulthood, but the ones that do will be able to survive just about anywhere, from watershed to City park.

We don’t know how many coyotes live on the Peninsula Watershed, but the abundance of rodents and other prey make the place ideal for the rangy, mid-sized predator. Along with other green spaces immediately next door, the 23,000-acre space provides an extensive wildlife corridor for them, mountain lions and other roving mammal species. 

Coyotes live in small and close-bonded family units, which at this time of year consist of the two monogamous parents, a couple of cubs from previous litters, and newborn pups. They will fiercely defend their own territory from other coyotes, but socialize with one another—playing, looking after each other, and communicating in a variety of ways, by look and body language as well multiple  yips, growls, whimpers, and howls. 

They routinely roam the same routes, and are superb hunters. They have  long powerful legs for wearing down quick-scurrying prey, along with acute vision, smell, and hearing (they can detect the scurry of a mouse from 100 feet away). Though they prefer mice, gophers and other small live animals, they’re “predators of opportunity,” and will consume whatever else comes there way, including carrion, greenery, berries--or (in more populated areas) a  wayward pet. 

After a year or so, older cubs move on.  A lone yearling in search of its own territory will roam large areas along freeways and even across bridges to suburbs or cities, and possibly back again (a main enemy being the car). A high number of young coyotes will not survive the first year or two of life.

Coyote Safety Tips

The coyote urge to avoid us aside, chance encounters happen, and the normally reclusive animal can be more territorial and assertive at this time of year, during pupping season. So here are some protective guidelines to help safeguard you and our wild neighbors, just in case.

• Never feed a coyote—it’s illegal and can lure it closer,  endangering you asnd others. 
• Keep unattended pets indoors or completely enclosed, especially at night. Also don’t assume a fence will keep a coyote out of your backyard.
• Keep dogs on short leashes (6 feet or less) while walking outside.
• Don’t run away or turn your back on a coyote.
• Yell, clap hands, and/or blow a whistle, and try to make yourself look larger to scare away a coyote in your yard or elsewhere nearby.   

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