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Sprawl of the Wild

A coyote boom leaves suburban residents howling.

By Sarah Fenske 

This 529-acre expanse in western Lorain is nothing special, as nature goes. Once farmland, the field is still neat, with rusted tractor parts more common than wildflowers.

The site may not be paradise, but it is significant: It's one of the last open spaces left in Lorain. A squinting trespasser might conjure up images of birds trilling over the muddy brook, of prairie grass, thistle, and dandelions. The pickup trucks whizzing along Meister Road to 7-Eleven or Burger King can seem miles away.

But now the land that once nurtured soybeans is about to grow houses. A group of developers is pitching plans for "Martin's Run," a new suburban enclave in an area better known for blight.

The partners envision townhouses, apartments, an assisted-living center, and cul-de-sac after cul-de-sac of vinyl siding and tasteful brick accents. It could mean more than 5,000 new people -- a big boom for a battered industrial city that has been losing residents for almost 30 years.

Unlike other housing projects, however, the group most affected by development plans won't be city officials, who see a new era beginning, or neighbors, who loathe the apartment component. The real change will hit a pack of coyotes that has made the acreage its home.

City officials believe at least eight coyotes live on the site. Some neighbors say they haven't noticed. Others are anxious.

"I'm very fearful of the coyotes," says Janet Latimer, who is legally blind and partially disabled by a stroke. "I don't know if they're lurking in the hedges. I've seen 'em as close as 50 feet away, just looking at you."

That's when Latimer flees to the house.

"They get on their haunches and look at you, and it's like they're saying, 'Maybe I didn't get that cat, but I'll get you,'" Latimer says, her voice trembling. "They haven't attacked a person out here, but you never know how they'll react and what they'll do. I've seen them kill a deer and drag it back to the woods. I've seen them chase cats. It is a bad situation."

Lorain's coyote problem is far from unusual. Residents from Solon to Strongsville have spotted the animals in their backyards, and most aren't happy about it. They say dogs have been attacked, garbage knocked over, and stray cats eaten. Some, like Latimer, are frightened.

Once unique to the West, coyotes are everywhere today. They live in all 88 Ohio counties and every state in the continental U.S. And almost everywhere, they are considered a nuisance.

Coyotes came to Ohio for two reasons. First, Midwestern forests were bulldozed to create flat, open spaces -- much like the grasslands of the West -- even as the West itself was gobbled up for strip malls and suburbia. Second, pest control nearly wiped out the coyotes' only real rival, the gray wolf.

"It's a territorial thing," says Bill Beagle of the state Division of Wildlife. "Whoever's the biggest and baddest will do well. Wolves were bigger and badder, but they're nearly gone. And the coyote is very adaptable. It's really the Alfred E. Neuman of the animal world."

Coyotes have adjusted remarkably well to the edges of civilization. They thrive on mice, rabbits, and raccoons. House cats are a tasty treat. In hard times, garbage will suffice.

Even the coyotes' soundtrack changed. In the old West, they howled in response to other coyotes. In the modern Midwest, they are more likely to respond to an ambulance siren, says Tom Stanley, chief of natural resources for the Cleveland Metroparks.

"The traditional way to count coyotes was to record howls, play them, and see what response you got," Stanley says. "In urban areas, the tape of a siren is sometimes the best response you get. That's how comfortable they've become."

But although coyotes have adjusted -- even thrived -- in the suburbs, their neighbors haven't taken as well to them.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture kills about 70,000 coyotes annually, 20,000 in Texas alone. In order to protect local ranchers, the government has sanctioned everything from cyanide to strychnine to aerial hunting.

More passive states like Ohio consider coyotes "varmints" and provide an endless open season for their hunt. In this state, the only barrier to shooting every coyote in sight is city ordinances restricting firearms.

The never-ending coyote hunt has generated little public outcry. Coyotes are too numerous to be endangered and too wily to foster much sympathy, though they're generally less dangerous than dogs.

"We refer to that as 'the Bambi syndrome,'" says Stanley, who hears vocal protests of deer hunting in the Metroparks each year. "You have charismatic wildlife and wildlife that aren't so charismatic. There are people who support coyotes and want them to have a chance to run free, but there aren't nearly as many as the deer supporters."

Even the Sierra Club has declined to take on the coyote issue. "It just hasn't come up," a spokesman at the state office says. The Ohio Department of Natural Resources does not condone killing coyotes, but it has done little to discourage it either.

Tom Gassner, who served almost 27 years as Solon's animal control officer, watched coyote complaints explode after that city's population doubled.

"No offense, but usually it's a woman, and usually she sees something on TV," Gassner says. "She'll call up and say, 'I have little kids,' or 'I have a dog.' Every time they see a coyote now, they panic."

Media reports have focused on the coyote as a fearless killer. One of the most notorious examples was a Fox 8 story that described coyotes preying on a dog. The segment ended with a child's swing, swaying empty in the breeze. The link was clear: First they'll get your pet, next your kid.

Parents reacted by calling City Hall and demanding action.

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