"Compensatory Reproduction" in Coyotes, why killing them equals more coyotes and less deer

[Dave N]

We didnt have any coyotes to speak of back then around here. But my old man tells stories of guys fist fighting over road killed fur on the side of the road back then.

$20 for a road kill coon! Good money at the time.

 

[antlerradar]

I remember my Uncle taking dozens and dozens, heck maybe even hundreds of coyotes from Shelby to Great Falls to sell at about that time frame. He ran cranes and killed coyotes in the winter. If you were a coyotes around Shelby, Montana back then, your life was in grave danger. mtmuley

My father would team up with a guy that shot coyotes from his Piper Cub with buck shot and take bids from fur buyers. Dad would have maybe 50, the guy with the cub would have in the hundreds.

 

[psinclair]

Where’s @psinclair?

Lining up a helicopter flight...

Busiest time of year for me, with 100,000 mother cows calving in my district.

 

[VioletCrown]

I read the article and while it provides some interesting observations it completely lacks scientific evidence to support the claim that reducing shooting coyotes will not positively impact your deer herd. That doesn't mean its not true but they have not shown it with any significant level of evidence. I do question the authors claim that "as a landowner or hunter, you simply do not have the means to decrease the coyote population on your property". Years ago with the help of the UDSA placing M-44's and snares (and us calling/shooting) we were able to reduce their population. I do agree that putting efforts into management and habitat will likely have a greater impact on increasing population... but that is pretty obvious.

 

[Mustangs Rule]

I read the article and while it provides some interesting observations it completely lacks scientific evidence to support the claim that reducing shooting coyotes will not positively impact your deer herd. That doesn't mean its not true but they have not shown it with any significant level of evidence. I do question the authors claim that "as a landowner or hunter, you simply do not have the means to decrease the coyote population on your property". Years ago with the help of the UDSA placing M-44's and snares (and us calling/shooting) we were able to reduce their population. I do agree that putting efforts into management and habitat will likely have a greater impact on increasing population... but that is pretty obvious.

My focus and efforts are going elsewhere this morning,,,bending my new knee, no pain no gain right. One attempt to get all the ROM at once won't work. It takes a repeated broad based progressive program firmly dedicated to.

Let's have ROM equal RANGE OF MIND and apply that not just to Coyotes but also to predators in general, and doing this also involves no pain no gain for hunters.

A lot of our practices have not worked. Or they only worked in what turned out to be a very narrow time frame or point of view.

There is a whole new wave of field biologists, armed with a dazzling array of new tools and techniques for information gathering. They are deeply examining the relationships between predators, prey animals, scavengers too and diseases of wildlife, some which transfer to us.

Creating healthy ecosystems goes so far beyond shooting, poisoning and trapping coyotes.

"Compensatory Immigration of predators " is another worthy area of field natural history to examine too.

Later if you wish ? or !

MR

 

[Bonasababy]

I read the article and while it provides some interesting observations it completely lacks scientific evidence to support the claim that reducing shooting coyotes will not positively impact your deer herd. That doesn't mean its not true but they have not shown it with any significant level of evidence. I do question the authors claim that "as a landowner or hunter, you simply do not have the means to decrease the coyote population on your property". Years ago with the help of the UDSA placing M-44's and snares (and us calling/shooting) we were able to reduce their population. I do agree that putting efforts into management and habitat will likely have a greater impact on increasing population... but that is pretty obvious.

What some don't realize is that the articles findings are settled science. From before many on the board were born.

Studies have shown the same thing for decades.

And beyond that, predation isn't a single species thing...thats particularly true for coyotes, where reducing their population temporarily favors foxes, who are a much more impactful predator of game birds and ground nesting waterfowl.

So target them all, you might say? That too has been studied and not shown to be possible at a large scale for common predators..the hole created by their loss is soon filled.

And it takes a much more intensive, year round effort to even create a temporary hole.

Habitat creation and maintenance on the other hand has long lasting positive effects.

 

[Mustangs Rule]

What some don't realize is that the articles findings are settled science. From before many on the board were born.

Studies have shown the same thing for decades.

And beyond that, predation isn't a single species thing...thats particularly true for coyotes, where reducing their population temporarily favors foxes, who are a much more impactful predator of game birds and ground nesting waterfowl.

So target them all, you might say? That too has been studied and not shown to be possible at a large scale for common predators..the hole created by their loss is soon filled.

And it takes a much more intensive, year round effort to even create a temporary hole.

Habitat creation and maintenance on the other hand has long lasting positive effects.

April 27/1962. The famous Twilight Zone series aired an episode titled The Gift.
In it a benevolent humanoid alien crashes lands on earth in Mexico, gets in a confrontation with terrified locals, they try to kill him, he fights back kills one of them before dying, but in his last moments alive he keeps trying to give them a book/ a medical journal, which they burn thinking it is evil.

The last scene shows to the book title, "The Cure for Human Cancer" being consumed amidst the flames.

I live in a 3,000 square mile county in the PNW, which has roughly 7,500 people, 15,500 elk, 21,000 deer and no detectable CWD and Elk Hoof rot.

Many scream too many wolves are here, but from my biologist's window the entire predator guild seems about right for natural predator bioremediation disease control in deer and elk.

In what seemed like a bright and shining moment during the last administration, over $30,000,000 was dedicated for CDW research at one of the best Vet Schools in the west.

Exciting CWD research was happening all over the mountain west helping to denature misinformation.

For example it was being stated that predators spread CWD prions when they killed and ate animals with CWD.

But quantitative research found this to only be correct to the 3.5% level The body chemistry of predators totally destroyed 96.5 % of the CWD Prions.

Predators naturally select out prey animals with CWD.

Back to Compensatory Reproduction and Compensatory Immigration of predators, these are bedrock field biology standards.

The greatest studies regarding "CR" and "CI" with mountain lions have come from Vancouver Is Canada, which is the Mt Lion hunting capitol of Norh America, with the highest Mt Lion density in North America.

Unfortunately, the population is soaring with sub-adult males. If one big Tom Mt Lion was left alone in each bio-territory he would drive out and kill these young male lions, and less deer would be killed.

Add to this, with a super high young male lion population, Vancouver Is, sets the records for Mt Lion attacks on livestock and people.

We have now gone back to era in which we just "burn knowledge" via denial smothering it with mis-information.

 

[Bonasababy]

Lions are certainly another good example. Older animals maintain and defend larger territories. Take them out and they get replaced by less experienced, more prone to cause trouble animals and more of them than when you started because of the smaller territories.

None of this is to say that taking predators is a problem, when it can justified as not affecting their population--which is most of the time where harvest is regulated--and in other cases where it's nearly impossible to drive their numbers down much.

Just have to know saying it helps prey out, minimizes human problems etc. isn't well grounded in science at all, in fact it can often be the reverse.