Coyotes in urban areas posing greater pet threat

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. -- If you leave cat food out at night, you might be attracting unwanted nocturnal guests. If you leave your cat out ... well, Fluffy might become din-din for a coyote.

Complaints about coyotes in urban areas are up 27 percent in a single year, notes Craig Miller, who studies human-beast interactions at the Illinois Natural History Survey.

It's not just coyotes in your neighborhood, but foxes, raccoons, Canada geese and opossums, he added, as housing developments take away habitat in corn fields and ponds near subdivisions create wetlands.

Larger mammals like deer cause far more danger -- to humans and deer alike. We're entering the "rut" season, autumn, in which romantically inclined white-tailed deer cross roads to meet each other and end up meeting with speeding cars.

More than 19,700 deer-vehicle collisions were reported on Illinois roads in 2000, according to the state Department of Natural Resources.

Miller is overseeing a study in which 2,100 randomly selected homeowners will receive surveys in the mail this month, asking about interactions with animals and what kind of problems they present.

From 1985 to 2000, complaints about nuisance wildlife rose 450 percent, Miller said.

Coyotes had the highest increase in complaints.

Providing good habitat

Miller has heard the coyote calling, and that's not meant in a metaphorical or spiritual sense. He has often seen the critters in his headlights, their yellow eyes beaming back at him.

It's not that there are more coyotes; there are more living among us.

"When we build housing developments, among the first things we do is plant trees and shrubs. Over 50 years, they grow into mature trees and hedges, proving an excellent habitat for coyotes," he said.

It's not uncommon, he said, for a coyote or a coyote-dog hybrid to weigh 40 pounds and be able to kill a cat.

University of Illinois professor emeritus Tom Burke said cats and dogs are not what coyotes are used to chowing down on.

"They prefer mice, voles and birds," he said.

But a cat can look pretty attractive on an empty stomach.

Miller warns against confronting them.

"Opossum, raccoons, any of these can be scary when you challenge them. Squirrels bit me as a kid. Coyotes have to be treated with respect; when you see a coyote, it may look like a dog, but it isn't," he said.