Originally published at: Berkeley man busted for offering bounty on coyotes after one killed his cat | Boing Boing
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The offending coyote has entered the witness protection program, and is currently posing as a student in LA.
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Or, you know, don’t let your pets wander unsupervised outdoors.
Every couple years a new family moves into our subdivision, and a month or so later the missing pet signs go up (usually a cat or small dog). We have foxes, and they will go for easy prey. I never mention to anyone about the foxes. I happen to like them, and the services they provide (they usually hunt around the row house dumpsters, catching the mice and rats).
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With so much displaced wildlife being forced into inhabited areas, the era of the indoor/outdoor pet is over.
Our local Nextdoor website is flooded with posts alerting neighbors to coyote and bobcat sightings, followed almost immediately by someone lamenting that their darling Fido or Fluffy has gone missing.
Keep 'em inside, folks.
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Name checks out
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Just across the bay, SF Animal Care and Control is seeking woman who was out FEEDING wild coyotes…
Looks very much like a Karen…
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This goes doubly for cats, under any circumstances. They’re hugely environmentally destructive, and they have much shorter lifespans (thanks to cars, if nothing else) if let outside.
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This is like the guy on craigslist, “technically you’re buying my demo cd for $40, and the weed is free.”
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I wonder if she knows they are coyotes? The first time I saw a coyote, I thought it was a malnourished stray. I wouldn’t try to feed one of those, either. A friend helpfully identified it correctly, and now I recognize coyotes on sight.
(She probably does, but I’d like to give the benefit of the doubt, based on my own experience.)
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Free-range pet hunts and kills local fauna: “Hey, keep some perspective. It’s all part of the circle of life.”
Local fauna hunts and kills free-range pet: ”This is an outrage that must not stand!!”
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Nah, I’d give the Craigslist guy more credit; at least his excuse will work on the IRS. The coyote guy is just spouting the kind of sovereign citizen bullshit that keeps forcing me to root for authoritarian bureaucrats.
Me, too. They also hunt skunks and can sometimes take a possum. A few years ago, very sadly, one got into my chicken pen, causing all kinds of havoc. I tried to shoo it away, but it was badly sick with mange so I had to put it down. That was incredibly sad.
ETA: I called animal control afterwards and was told that the entire population of foxes in the field behind my house was infected. One chicken was killed, and two injured badly enough that they never laid eggs again. they lived out their lives in happy retirement.
The entire incident is now burned into family legend. I was sitting down to some morning, um, business on the throne, when I heard all hell break loose in the chicken area. The chickens were screaming and squawking, like I’d never heard. So I ran out of the house, trying to pull my shorts up and figure out what was happening, expecting to see the morning hawk that always comes around looking for an easy meal. Instead I came face-to-face with a half-bald, nasty looking fox holding a dead chicken, with two other chickens bloody and a bit mangled walking dazedly nearby. My shorts still only half-up I screamed and waved my hands at the fox. When it moved closed instead of running away it finally dawned on me that I was standing barefoot in the coop-yard area, no shirt, shorts not pulled up, neighbors coming out of their houses to see the commotion, and a wild animal with sharp teeth advancing on me. Nothing can make you feel like less of an apex predator than that sort of thing, let me tell you. I kicked some mud at it, and it dropped the chicken and ran over the fence. Then it turned and started to come back. I threw some sticks and it ran away. I went back inside, tried to regain some dignity, got a gun (.22cal, loaded with “shorts”), and came back outside. It had returned, grabbed the dead chicken, and gone back over the fence about 50 yards into the field. I shot it, got a bag, and collected the carcass for animal control to examine.
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The poor thing! Ultimately merciful, though, and hopefully prevented infection of other foxes.
We’ve had foxes investigate the rabbit hutches at night (we put them outside during the day when the weather is nice, but bring them in at night). I didn’t know about the skunks and possums! We have a couple of the latter in the neighborhood. Possums are huge!
My condolences to your chickens.
If someone/something killed my cat, I’d be out for blood too, irregardless of it being my fault or not. Thirst for vengeance doesn’t turn on the original injury being avoidable.
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