# Coyote; Native or non-native?



## FixedBlade (Oct 14, 2002)

I was reading in the paper about Coyote attacks on pets on the rise. In the article it stated that Coyotes are native to Michigan. So are Coyotes native or non-native to the state of Michigan?


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## griffondog (Dec 27, 2005)

Coyote's didn't show up in Michigan till the late 1800's, early 1900's. So how many years you have to be here to be a native Michigander? :lol:

Griff


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## David G Duncan (Mar 26, 2000)

I have never read any articles on when coyotes may have first turned up in Michigan, my experience would support what Grif has posted.

My guess is that once Michigan began to be settled and the settler started reducing the wolf population, that the coyotes moved in to take up the slack. Wolves really don't like to tolerate coyotes in their home territories, very well.

My Dad told me a story about watching a pack of wolves chasing a deer back in the late 1920's. He was working as a lineman, constructing an electric transmission line coming out of Tippy Dam near Wellston. From his perch on the top of a steel tower, he watched the deer go by and then wolves in pursuit. He banged his wrench on the tower and it spooked the wolves and they left the deer trail. This was a rare sighting back then and the wolves must have when extinct shortly after that in the L. P..

Things are always changing in nature, especially as man influences the environment around him.

Back when I started trapping 50 years ago there were no Gray Fox is Michigan and Red Fox were every where. As far I know there were none or very few coyotes in southern Michigan back then either. We could however catch coyotes in the U. P., back then.

As a kid growing up in southern Michigan back in the 1950's it was very rare to see any whitetail deer. Although there were some deer in the area back when southern Michigan was first settled, but apparently the settlers pretty much cleaned them out as a source of meat. There was no closed season on deer back then.

The fact that there are Fisher in the U. P. now, is the direct result of man relocating them there and in northern Wisconsin. I appreciate the opportunity this man-made change has given us, to try to harvest a Fisher in Michigan. And I really would not mind if the Fisher were also established in the L. P., along with the Pine Marten.

The success of Michigan's wild turkey population is the direct result of the relocation of turkeys from Pennsylvania, back I believe in the 1960's or late 1950's. The DNR of Michigan made an agreement to trade River Otters from Michigan for turkeys from Pennsylvania. I know this is true, because I took a live otter I caught in a mink set, to the biologist (Gordon Huff) at the Cadillac DNR hdqt. and they shipped it to Pennsylvania to help repay this trade agreement related to the Michigan Wild Turkey program. So even I, can take some credit for the great Turkey hunting we enjoy in Michigan today.


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## 2PawsRiver (Aug 4, 2002)

An interesting read...thanks


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## griffondog (Dec 27, 2005)

Had a Pm pow wow with Asa Lenon today and he informed me coyotes were in the UP by 1900. Around 1920 Michigan was hiring trappers to catch Wolves, bear and coyotes. They were trying to promote the UP as sheep ranching country. 

He said the first coyote he heard about in the lower was caught in a fox set near Alpena around 1955. Must of got in the lower when the lake froze up. Funny they were in the UP for over 50 years before they got in the lower.

Dave cool story about the wolves. The Dnr always said the last wolves in the lower were killed off by 1910.

The first coyote I heard of in the southern third was caught in Marshall in the mid 70's. I still think the coyotes we have in the southern part of the state migrated north not south.


Griff


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## Gary A. Schinske (Jul 10, 2006)

Dave:
They have also introduced Pine Marten in the lower but not fisher. In a recent conversation with the DNR there have been no verifiable sighting of fisher in the lower. Got any guesses as to why I was having that conversation with the DNR????


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## David G Duncan (Mar 26, 2000)

Gary,

Very interesting! Thanks for the insight.

It would be interesting to know what the estimated population of Pine Marten in the lower might be. 

I had a friend that swore that he saw a Pine Marten near the Boardman River SE of T. C. back in the mid 70's. It seemed a little strange to me back then, but I guess it could have been possible. It just seems that if they have been around for over thirty years in this areas, that they would have increased in numbers to the point that we would be seeing more of then.


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## trapper_max (Jul 23, 2007)

2PawsRiver said:


> An interesting read...thanks


agreed


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## FixedBlade (Oct 14, 2002)

My guess is someone caught in the lower?


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## THUMBTRAPPER (Nov 17, 2006)

Hey guys this is a really good thread...I havent logged on in a long time. My summers are spent out on the shipwrecks of lake huron diving so apolige. Anyways my buddy i work with who has trapped the Thumb area all his life told me a story about about the first Coyote they caught back in the early 80's. Made big news with the local trappers and dog runners because there never was one caught in the thumb area, at least in the sandusky area! Now there are tons of them. I see very little Red Fox sign while checking my line, but the Coyotes are everywhere!!! but you go 25 minutes south west near the Yale area there are tons of Reds! Its crazy...Anyways great post and Good story Dave about the Otters!!!


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## Linda G. (Mar 28, 2002)

I've done a couple of articles on pine martens in the lower, have some awesome photos from the Grand Traverse Band of Odawa and Chippewa Indians, whose biologists have conducted tracking surveys of the martens in the northern lower for the last several years. 

They were first reintroduced into four or five locations in the northern lower in the middle 80's by the feds and the DNR. One location is in the Pigeon River, another near West Branch, another in the Manistee Nat'l Forest near Wellston, I'm not sure about the other areas. 

Both the Grand Traverse Band and the Little River band have been radio tracking the martens, and have found that there are small populations (or at least, they haven't found a lot of them) in the Wellston area and in the Pigeon River. Some of those were quite a ways from where they were originally stocked, so there may be more, the tribes aren't sure. 

I have had a couple of reports of them around here, and I'm almost 75 miles from the Pigeon, further from where the martens have been surveyed, so I'm not sure if they've moved or if those are cougar stories. 

They are neat little creatures, but not the best news for game birds and squirrels, so I'm content with populations being relatively low. No one really knows if they are or not, without a limited trapping season of some kind, it's impossible to really track their movements. 

The trapping season in the UP most definitely needs to be liberalized.


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