I’ll stand by what I say on the coyotes being a pig predator and on my side. And, I have raised my share of cattle and horses. Never lost any stock to coyotes and that covers a lot of years. No experience on sheep, chickens, etc. I generally consider coyotes as the ultimate scavenger.

I know that they take a lot of fawns but, without predation, deer can over breed. If each mature doe reproduces itself, they can easily increase their population by about 40% per year. Available browse, even including winter wheat, can’t support that. This figures on some natural mortality.

A friend inNorthern Indiana put a game cam on a coyote den last year. As I recall, the mama fed the pups on 20 something fawns and yearlings. And yet, he says there is still no shortage of deer on his place.

I’ve often wondered about the natural mortality of coyote pups and other wildlife. Some time back we had a 4 year drought. We lost a lot of wildlife, both predators and prey and it hasn’t really rebounded to pre drought numbers.

I don’t feel the same way about the damn coons.