I’ve done my fair share of backwoods backpacking in my youth. I didn’t exactly go where no man has gone before, but I did walk without fear where it would have probably taken a few months for someone to stumble across my remains if I had broken a leg.
Let me just say that people who have never been out in the wild are fucking stupid when it comes to the animals who live there. Case in point is this story from a few years ago of a woman who was badly injured during a javelina attack while walking her dogs in a suburban neighborhood. And how did these notoriously wary beasts lose their natural fear of man? Because the neighbors were feeding the hogs, probably because they thought they were just so cute and cuddly.
Like I said, fucking stupid.
Got dogs? I do! Love em’ to death! Mainly because they love me back.
They are both about 50 pounds (22 kilos). Not small, no. Even so, I go out with them every single time I let them into the yard to water the bushes. Why? Because there are coyotes about! You can hear them yipping and howling in the wee hours of the night if they should happen to catch and kill something.
What would one obese man who is in advanced middle age do if three or four coyotes should hop the fence and be in the yard when I and my beloved dogs should venture forth one fine morning? Shoot them, obviously. I am always armed if it is legal to be armed, after all.
So my dogs are medium sized, and cannot be snatched up by a coyote on the run. What about people with smaller beasts?
You would have to be some sort of quick draw artist, as well as one fine shot, to be able to gun down fast moving threats on the fly as they close in on your fuzzy darlings. Most likely the predator would maim or kill the dog even if you were a modern shootist.
Thanks to the Southern Rockies Nature Blog, we have been given a heads up to he CoyoteVest, armor for your itty bitty pooch!
Don’t laugh! It was designed by someone who lost their dog to a coyote attack.
What is it with that forest of brightly colored plastic spikes? Keeps eagles and other raptors from swooping down and using their talons to sever the spine of the puppy. Makes the lapdog look bigger too.
This really isn’t anything new. Modern hunting dogs that go after very dangerous game, such as the aforementioned wild hogs, can be outfitted with kevlar vests to keep them from becoming eviscerated by the razorbacks.
And who can forget the scene from Conan the Barbarian (1982) where some wardogs kill Conan’s father?
If you happen to own small dogs and you live where you can hear the howl of the coyote, you might think of armoring up the pooch. But don’t go unarmed in case the predators decide your pets are hard targets, while you look all soft and ready for the fang.
Interesting tale, and yes I can believe people feeding the wildlife ‘cos it’s cute and cuddly, and then wondering why it’s invading the neighbourhood.
Coyotes are rather thin on the ground in the UK, so I’m going to have to nick a story from author Jim Butcher. (Writes good stuff IMHO.) Anyway in the introduction to the anthology ‘Shadowed Souls’ he tells the tale of coyotes howling outside his house, and he reckoned that they were trying to goad his old little dog into coming outside where he would get turned into coyote snacks. So Mr Butcher goes out bold and confident making “Get off my land” noises, and walks confidentially towards the source of the howling. And the coyotes don’t scat, they start moving up on his left and on his right . . .
At this point Mr Butcher realises that he might be in potential danger and retreats back to his house. He turns off the lights and steps outside again, this time very quietly and with a loaded rifle. He says that within seconds the coyotes all went quiet . . .
As said this is a second-hand story, and sorry if you’ve heard it before, but I think it’s interesting, scary and fits neatly in with your observations about coyotes.
That anti-coyote armour for dogs reminds me somewhat of 2000AD’s anti-mugger suit (in the Dredd strip).
Do you know what the effectiveness of the sort of handgun you usually carry (9mm?) is against wild pigs, if you don’t mind me asking?
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