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Boston city councilor wants constituents to take a deep breath and calm down about coyotes already

City Councilor Matt O'Malley, who represents some of Boston's more countrified areas in Jamaica Plain and West Roxbury, went on a Twitter tear, well, tearette, tonight about all the coyotes his constituents are reporting

I’ve also seen a huge explosion in the number of rabbits around the neighborhood. Unfortunately for the rabbits, these two phenomena ARE related.

Indeed:

In any case, O'Malley offers the usual tips: Take a deep breath and keep a close watch on your small pets outdoors (also, coyotes are not just nocturnal, so, no, seeing one during the day doesn't mean it's rabid). Yelling or blowing a whistle at them will usually make them go away. And call his office or 311 if you see one.

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Comments

I saw one just walking down the sidewalk past a guy with his kid in the stroller. It was fat and happy, no fear of humans.

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Once coyotes and other wild animals lose their fear of humans, that's where the real danger lies. Be careful!!

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two coyotes walking down a suburban street, while a human pushing a stroller watches them curiously. One coyote says to the other, "Watch out. Once they lose their fear of us, that's when they become really dangerous."

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Hey, listen, SamWack! Either you really don't seem to understand the fact that coyotes and other wild animals can and do, at times, become human-conditioned, lose their fear of humans, thereby producing more risk to human beings and their pets alike, or you're just stupidly playing devil's advocate, due to a legitimate position that I wrote on here. Either you're not very smart, or you're just plain nasty.

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He has a sense that you lack: of humor.

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That kind of a thing is nothing to laugh or joke about. The fact that enough people have little or no respect for wildlife is what has helped lead to this kind of a situation where wild animals, including coyotes who become human-conditioned and lose their fear of humans, and thus present a real danger for people.

Come to think of it, I'd be willing to bet that if a wild coyote who'd been hanging around where you live for sometime, attacked either you or your pet (providing you have one), seriously injured either you or your pet, or killed your pet outright, that you'd be laughing on the other side of your face; inotherwords, you wouldn't be laughing.

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Your tragic fantasy has not happened to me, or to you, has it? You might as well say "If space aliens landed and threatened you with anal probing if you laughed about coyotes, you'd take it more seriously." Yeah, I probably would.

Makes me wonder what traumatic event made you so uptight about this.

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One doesn't have to have personally experienced being attacked by a wild animal such as a coyote, a bear, or whatever, to realize the kind of stuff that can result, due to many people either camping, hiking, or even taking up residence in the natural habitat of wild animals. There are people who do stupid things such as feed wild animals human food, or whatever, or get too close to them. People have been seriously mauled or even killed by bears, coyotes, or other wild animals who've lost their fear of people as a result, becoming more human-conditioned.

Have you ever seen the documentary film "Grizzly Man"? If not, you should rent the DVD version of it, and you'll see what can result if humans get too close to wild animals.

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Coyote attacks on people are very rare. More people are killed by errant golf balls and flying champagne corks each year than are bitten by coyotes.

There have only been two recorded incidences in the United States and Canada of humans being killed by coyotes. One involved a child in Southern California in the 1980s and the other a 19-year old woman in Nova Scotia in 2009. These events, rare as they are, are serious and warrant serious response
http://www.humanesociety.org/animals/coyotes/tips/coyotes_people.html

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Now we should be Very Serious about coyotes because an idiot tempted fate by offering himself to grizzly bears and died doing it. I wasn't going to do that anyway, regardless of what jokes I find amusing. Hey, I used to have a T-shirt that said "Protect your right to keep and arm bears," with a picture of a polar bear holding a Thompson. I guess I was really living dangerously with that one.

Where do you live that there are no wild animals, anyway? Squirrels can deliver a nasty bite, and those turkeys have been acting up. Have you seen that Hitchcock documentary The Birds? Maybe you never go outside?

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Similar to this:

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"that you'd be laughing on the other side of your face; inotherwords, you wouldn't be laughing."

Miki, does this have anything to do with the north-bound end of a south-bound mule?

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Of course we're going to see more of them. More housing equals more confused, hungry and displaced wildlife. Just feed them and they'll become your friend.

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Just feed them and they'll become your friend.

Yeh, right! Ha ha ha ha ha!!

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More foxes. Or concealed carry.

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they're not desirable to have among the human population, either.

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Somewhere a place for them

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In fact they're pretty easy to outsmart. I had a problem coyote that was harassing me, but I found that using his own tricks against him was really the best solution. His Rube Goldberg type contraptions were especially easy to outsmart and were usually prone to backfiring. Also I found that it was pretty easy to trick him into running into somewhat realistic murals painted onto rock faces in the area that depict the roadway going through the ledge in a tunnel. Coyotes just aren't that smart.

Beep, beep!

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Coyote sharks!

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And call 311 if you see one

I can see the responses now:

Coyote not spotted. Left ACME catalog at location of sighting. Case Closed

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Those coyotes start knawing on those sunscreen dispensers you provided, it'll be cull the herd time!

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Sounds like we need designated coyote travel lanes so they can move around safely without risking dangerous encounters with humans.

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As the roadrunner never leaves the road^^, they will use the dedicated lane, and the coyote will follow them.

^^Chuck Jones' second rule for the Coyote/Roadrunner series

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That's when they're hungry and get bold.

They'll be snatching up somebody's little shish-ka-bow-wow and it will be a huge tragedy.

Ever notice how there are fewer stray cats around?

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