But I wanted to talk about some of the things I’ve been reading and thinking about.

One of the books I finished was “God’s Dog”: by Hope Ryden, which is about the coyote. Ms. Ryden spent two years observing, researching, and photographing coyotes. During the time I was reading the book, we actually sighted two coyotes not far from the house. (Photos of them here)

Two things struck me in particular. The first is that my husband and I are thrilled to sight a coyote. We love wild and natural things and the coyote is an elusive and exciting animal to see – for us. “God’s Dog” was written in 1975, and at that time there was a huge fight going on over using poison bait to exterminate the coyote (and anything else that happened to feed on carrion). Without being preachy about it, Ms. Ryden makes it clear that coyotes are not the danger to livestock that they are painted as being, and that there are other methods of protecting livestock. In 1930 our Congress passed a law that pretty much said “We’re going to sterilize the West – we’re going to exterminate every single creature there except the few we like to hunt – elk, deer, etc.” By 1975 it had become abundantly clear that this wasn’t a good idea. By that time policies were already changing in favor of allowing nature to take care of herself.

But here it is, 2007. My hubby mentioned seeing a coyote to a co-worker (when he was working) in town and the first comment was “Did you shoot it? You know, you can cut off their ears and get $15 bounty.” Over 30 years later – and there is still a bounty on coyotes. There are no sheep ranchers any where near us that I know of. And coyotes are simply not capable of bringing down cattle. So why? Haven’t we learned anything?

Not far from here, in the Gila Wilderness area, they are reintroducing the Red Wolf. Man just about managed to exterminate that species. Then discovered this upset the balance of nature. So now man is breeding wolves in captivity to be released back into the wild.

There is a problem with that. The wolves that are released are now habituated to man. They aren’t afraid of us. They have no inhibition about coming around a building or set of buildings that are scented of man, and bringing down a horse or attacking a domestic dog. Already there have been incidents such as these.

I don’t have the answers. I feel the wolves have a right to be there, and need to be there. I feel, too, for the people who lost a horse to the wolf pack. I love horses. Somewhere there is an answer to this problem – but I do not have it. We need to find a way to recreate the wolves natural caution and fear of man so they will stay away from buildings and homes, seeking instead their natural prey and wild places. Yet, because we’ve nearly wiped them out, they need our help to raise their numbers and monitor them until the species recovers. No, I don’t have the answer to this one. But someone, or some group, I hope at least has some ideas.

(Since I wrote this there has been another article in the local paper - there are 59 wolves in five packs, seven breeding pairs - thus the numbers are high enough that ranchers now have permission to kill a wolf they find with a livestock kill. The alpha male of the pack that brought the horse down is in particular marked to be trapped or killed)

I am always saying I want to live to be 100 because it will be so interesting to see how things turn out. I hope that one thing I do not see is the extermination of the coyote – and then our confused and difficult efforts to re-establish yet another species!

Blessedbe