A competitive coyote hunt in central Alberta this weekend is targeting the predator’s population to control its numbers, but some wildlife groups are raising alarm about how effective the event will be.
The first Coyote Classic is scheduled for Saturday and Sunday in Stettler County, just east of Red Deer. Competing teams will hunt as many coyotes as possible over the two days, with the team that brings in the most pelts winning $2,500 and a new hunting rifle for each team member.
Lee Bates, the owner of Storm Mountain Outfitters in Stettler, is the organizer behind the event. He notes that the Coyote Classic is responding to an increase in the area’s coyote population, which is creating problems for the county. He said he has heard from farmers and ranchers who are losing livestock to coyotes while other wildlife populations are declining.
“As hunters and I own a hunting store, I hear a lot about how the deer population and the moose and elk populations are down,” Bates said in an interview with CBC’s The house of house last week. “I think some may be due to [chronic wasting disease]but I think that also [is due] to the increase in the population of predators.
The house of house8:591st Annual Coyote Classic
A town in central Alberta is preparing for a competitive coyote hunt this month.
More than 100 people are expected to participate in the event this weekend. The event includes a banquet dinner on Saturday, with some of the proceeds going to the Stettler Food Bank. Taxidermists and local hunters will judge the harvested pelts for additional prizes, rewarding the heaviest or gerno coyote captured.
“We had to keep it interesting … and just make it a fun event, as well as control the population,” Bates said.
Farmers have struggled with losing livestock to coyote attacks for years, and some have recently called for the predators to be added to the wildlife compensation program.
But Alberta Wilderness Association conservation specialist Ruiping Luo argues there are better ways to manage wildlife-human conflict, such as fencing, careful handling of livestock and removing materials that attract animals. coyotes. Tasking and behavioral management may also be more effective in keeping animals away from specific areas, he said.
The problem with the event’s approach, Luo argues, is that it doesn’t explain the effect it will have on other wildlife in the area.
“We would like to see a holistic view where you try to manage the ecosystem,” Luo said.
“This targeted focus on one predator tends to not allow for understanding all of the impacts beyond just shooting or killing this predator.”
Luo adds that the Coyote Classic appears to be part of a larger trend of opening up hunts to predators, and using this as a primary solution to human-wildlife conflict.
Bates says he understands that not everyone will agree with the hunt, but argues that blubber and disease in coyotes are signs that the population is getting too high and that a better job is needed to control the predator. He added that the event may be put on the burner in the future if the coyote population stays under control after this year.
Stettler County Reeve Larry Clarke agrees that coyotes have been a growing problem for years. Clarke, who owns a farm near Gadsby, Alta., where he is a cow producer, said coyotes too often prey on newborn livestock, especially sheep.
“I know for myself as a producer, there have been coyote problems everywhere. You just go out at night and that’s all you can hear at night is Coyotes,” Clarke said, noting that the county offered sponsorship for the Coyote Banquet Classic.
But Lesley Sampson, founding director of Coyote Watch Canada, argues that an organized search may not be effective.
She worries about the ecological impact of the contest, as coyotes themselves control rodent populations and remove dead animals from the land.
More than that, Sampson points out that hunting could have the opposite effect of what it intends. Removing older, more dominant coyotes from your territory, where you can regulate other coyotes from mating or having litters in that territory, can open up that area for more coyotes to move and breed. Targeting coyotes can also force them to migrate to new areas they were not previously inhabiting.
“A killing contest is just that. It’s a contest. It’s not adding any kind of ecological population management,” Sampson said.
