weather folk say i might see 50 degrees next week.....mmmmmm.....50 whole degrees.
wind right now is kickn' up snow so thick i can't see my frozen hand in front of my frozen face.
anyway....i caught a picture of this coyote passing in front of the house a few days back. I'm tempted to say its a male due to the size...and i think he's the one i see with this small very white female. they were the pair that made off with an aborted calf fetus last spring on my neighbors land....wached the whole drama unfold from my front porch. They came back several times each in order to carry off another big piece. I'm sure it was quite the feast for the whole family.
I've had encounters with them in my pasture and each time they were less afraid of us all....so a few months ago when i went outside to find coyote right by the garden just staring up at the house.....i let the dogs after him and gave him a good scare.
its no good having friendly coyotes around, and no good for them either. they need to stay wild and afraid of humans. 9 outta ten around here would have shot him...which makes me think of that kingsolver story, "prodigal summer" and the bit about how if you kill off coyotes they will reproduce in greater numbers ...givin' ya even more coyotes.
there is another really huge male that i've seen and folks down the valley have seen him as well.He is grey and black and rumor is he's a wolf cross....everyone always loves a good wolf legend. ghosts they are really, like all truly wild things....romantic, a little frightening.
if only we could be so lucky to have that predator back in the woods...
everytime they try and re-introduce mexican wolves back into the wilds of new mexico they are quickly shot by cattle ranchers or hit by cars.....that just about says it all.
poor planet.
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2 comments:
Have you a shotgun?
A girl needs her shotgun.
Are you going to be breeding your ewes? Most surely will need a shotgun at lambing time.
They re-introduced coyotes up here in the Smokies. They have done very well. They aren't like the scrawny little coyotes I saw when I was on the west coast. They are big and wolf-sized. I didn't think this a particularly inspired thing to do. We have an endangered red wolf population that has already had too much dangerous taint from interbreeding with dogs and grey wolf. I'm much more tolerant of wolves than I am of coyotes.
I don't worry too much about the coyotes, and i'm not planning on breeding anybody, but will be once i've got goats. Llamas are coyote killers...at least my older one is. and they make this nutty sound whenever theres somethin' around....esp. bear . I keep my sheep close so with the llamas and the dogs, it works pretty well.i actually worry more about stray, marauding dog packs from the valley below.a llama can't handle a pack of canines.
I'm most weary of men really.
thats when ya need yr shotgun.
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