Central Park Coyote

I wanted to wait a week to post these photos to ensure the Coyote had moved on to a more private sleeping spot. Depending on who you talk to we have either two or more Coyotes in the park. I’ve seen two together in the northern end of the park and in the center of the park others often see two together. These could be the same animals or two pair.

Other large cities have Coyote populations in the hundreds, so I suspect over time we’ll have more Coyotes in Central Park and Manhattan. Despite their reputation as being a danger to pets and livestock, Eastern Coyotes generally try to avoid people.

Owl Rules for Central Park Coyotes?

Yesterday, I discovered one of Central Park Eastern Coyotes in a location that has been used by coyotes on and off for a few years in the spring. I had seen it there a few days earlier and posted a few pictures on Instagram and posted a video on YouTube from yesterday without stating the location. But maybe I shouldn’t have.

Everything was quiet and the coyote was sleeping when I arrived, and I was the only observer. However, the coyote’s location had been posted on twitter, so more and more people started showing up, and you could see the coyote’s ears perk up repeatedly. Our presence was clearly annoying the coyote.

When I started watching a coyote years ago in Hallett Sanctuary, I blogged about the coyote for a month and started a good discussion about how we should treat coyotes that arrive in the park. It ended up with the police, parks and the NYS DEC develop a good policy about what to do about coyotes in Manhattan. At the time Hallett was still locked and not open to the public, so my blogging about the coyote didn’t threaten its welfare.

But times have changed and we now have at least two resident coyotes in the park. Now that they are residents, I realize this morning that it might be time to put “owl rules” in place to avoid any unnecessary harassment of the coyotes. By owl rules, I mean that to protect sleeping birds and animals from being disturbed that we keeping their locations off social media and delay posting photographs of the animals until they have stopped using the den or roost.

Our infatuation with birds and animals can sometimes do more harm than good. So, to be on the safe side, I’m going to take my time from now on and post coyote images a few weeks after they have moved on to new locations.

A Central Park Coyote

I stumbled upon a sleeping Coyote in Central Park today, while looking for American Woodcocks who should start appearing in the next few weeks.

The Coyote was sleeping peacefully on a protected ridge and was well camouflaged in the leave litter. The animal slept peacefully until disturbed breifly by an off-leash dog. When it did leave after dusk, it left quickly through some underbrush and was quickly out of sight.

Central Park most likely has three coyotes at the moment, although the count could be higher. They’ve been in the park for the last few years and there have been no issues. Coyotes are very shy, and do their best to avoid contact with people. However, it is very important not to feed them. Once people begin to feed them they can become very agressive.

Last Year’s Snowy Owl and Eastern Coyote

On February 26th last year, I had one of most incredible experiences of my life, seeing both a Snowy Owl and an Eastern Coyote on the North Meadow of Central Park. With the anniversary of the Snowy Owl’s arrival, I started to review old footage. Last year, I had presented the video as two different post. But we saw them at the same time.

As the Snowy Owl moved from a backstop on the eastern side of the North Meadow to one on the western side, she basically flew over the Eastern Coyote drawing our attention to the animal. It was an evening I will never forget, and something I never expect to see again. So, don’t let anyone tell you Central Park isn’t wild!