By Connie Leinbach
The U.S. Department of Agriculture Wildlife Service caught and euthanized three coyotes on Ocracoke in August, but that doesn’t guarantee that there are not others or that more will show up.
That was the message by N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission (NCWRC) and Cape Hatteras National Seashore (Seashore) officials at a meeting in the Community Center on Ocracoke Sept. 23 to report on the status of coyotes on Ocracoke.
This was a follow-up from a meeting in July when Seashore officials met with a group of islanders concerned about recent coyote sightings and their impact on sea turtle nests and possible incursion into Ocracoke village.
At the Seashore’s request, USDA sent a team to investigate the status of coyotes and they trapped and euthanized three.
Meaghan Johnson, chief of resource management, said that while coyotes have been spotted in the Seashore since 2009, they were first detected on Ocracoke in 2023.
When the USDA came in August, they spent two weeks on Ocracoke looking for signs of coyotes and found them in the middle and at both ends of the island.
“They did track and dispatch three adult male coyotes,” she said, and they did not see any signs of additional coyotes for about five days before they left.
Matt Janson, the Seashore’s biological science technician on Ocracoke, said that neither he nor his staff has actually seen a coyote, an indication of their elusiveness.
“We’ve seen only their signs and we’re out there every single,” he said. They have not seen coyote signs since the USDA eliminated the three males.
Falyn Owens, a biologist with the NCWRC who specializes in wildlife-human conflicts, detailed how coyotes have spread eastward since the early 1900s.
While people settled the West, efforts were made to eradicate large predators—wolves, mountain lions, bears—across the country.
“But coyotes have only expanded in the face of human population growth,” she said.
She explained how they reproduce according to the need to maintain their pack, but they don’t overproduce unless they suffer a big loss in population, as would occur with eradication attempts.
Coyote couples seek out their own territory and might walk hundreds of miles to find a spot and defend that territory from other coyotes.
Efforts to eradicate them have continually failed because they are survivalists.
“These are animals that do extremely well wherever human beings are,” she said.
But they are risk averse and do not want to interact with human beings. While they eat all kinds of stuff, rodents are the biggest part of their meat diet.
Coyotes swim, she said, and that’s how the ones on Ocracoke got here.
“Ocracoke Island might be the last place in the United States other than Hawaii to get coyotes,” Owens said.
Because coyotes regulate their own population and will roam hundreds of miles and swim incredible distances to get to unoccupied territories, it means that, as far as has been the case for centuries, you can’t get rid of coyotes, she said.
Johnson said over the last five years the Seashore has lost less than 7 percent of the turtle eggs to coyote predation and they hope that by using predator guards around the nests, it will diminish.
Dallas Shoemaker, WRC District 1 biologist, explained that the number one prevention for keeping coyotes away is not having ready food sources outside.
Private landowners may take lethal removal actions but must do so according to local laws.
Ruth Fordon, one of a group of island volunteers who help with cold-stunned and nesting sea turtles, said the presentations helped with understanding coyote biology.
“However, Ocracoke Island is in a unique situation where the norms attributed to coyotes may not be as applicable to us,” she said. “Even though coyotes are excellent swimmers they are rare here without a land bridge north, west or south, unlike the rest of the Seashore. The excellent work of NPS to totally eradicate them in August leaves me with hope that we can continue on this path of eradication when they appear as problematic to our habitat.”
David Hallac, superintendent of the Cape Hatteras National Seashore, said the Seashore will continue to work with the community regarding coyote management and noted a study on this issue will be forthcoming from NC State University.
