State stares down coyotes, by committee

RALEIGH -- The coyote, enduring symbol of the untamed West and scourge of ranchers and roadrunners alike, has crept onto the silhouetted landscape of urban North Carolina.

Onto those dusty streets, heroes have stepped - hardened men, their coffee spoons jingling, aiming to teach these critters that there is law in these parts.

Yes, it's a legislative study committee.

In recent months, coyotes have been spotted trotting across the runway at Raleigh-Durham International Airport and in Durham backyards. But call county animal control or state wildlife officials, and the best they can usually do is provide the name and number of a trapper for hire.

So the N.C. House of Representatives, led by Speaker Joe Hackney, bespectacled Chapel Hill lawyer and Chatham County cattle farmer, has cowboyed up.

Hackney gathered a posse of a half-dozen House members to the Select Committee on Coyote Nuisance Removal. They rustled up legislation this week that, even if it passes, won't live up to the word "removal" in the committee's name.

You see, there are 50,000 coyotes in North Carolina, according to the Wildlife Resources Commission. They're in every county. State biologists put a GPS tracking collar on one in Tyrrell County, near the coast, and it walked 220 miles in 30 days.

"It's not a matter of just standing up and saying let's get rid of 'em," said Rep. Arthur Williams, a Beaufort County Democrat who chaired the committee. "We're going to have to live with 'em."

Coyotes are clever. Wily even. When they settle near people, they get used to being around humans, said state biologist Jon Shaw, whose territory stretches from Moore County to Mecklenburg County.

Snaring, poisoning

The committee's bill would let landowners who raise animals apply to the state for a permit to use a neck, or collar, snare. It's a flexible cable with a loop and a locking device that tightens around the coyote as it passes through to reach the bait.

The contraption is a role reversal from a whole peck of cartoon devices used by, not on, a coyote.

Another device the committee heard about, deserving of having a large "ACME" logo, is the M-44 ejector. When the coyote bites the bait, the device fires sodium cyanide into the animal's mouth. The varmint falls unconscious and dies within minutes.

What about shooting them?

"Yeah, you can shoot 'em," Williams said. "They're not animals. They're predators."

Texas Gov. Rick Perry this week recollected shooting a coyote with his laser-sighted .380-caliber pistol near his home in Austin a few weeks back. "He became mulch," Perry told the Associated Press.

For the firearms-averse, North Carolina state biologist Colleen Olfenbuttel told the committee that guard animals can scare off coyotes, but she mentioned more than guard dogs, according to the minutes of the meeting: "Llamas and donkeys have been effective."

As in the days of swinging saloon doors, the orneriest will survive.