Readers weigh in on coyote issue

READER WANTS COYOTES THINNED OUT

Your article on coyotes (“Small pets around valley can be a target for coyotes,” April 2 View editions) was well-taken, well-written, but useless. I’ve been fighting this battle in this valley for 27 years, and it only gets worse. If people don’t know the extent of this problem by now, there is no help for them. And if people are still feeding coyotes, they are in the most dangerous stages of denial. Where is the outrage?

After a long absence, coyotes returned to my neighborhood. My presence didn’t startle him. I chased him off with a pellet gun. I should have used a .22. I alerted my neighbors and advised them not to put out garbage until the morning of pickup and keep all animals inside. I reminded them that dogs fight, but coyotes kill! Some listened, but others looked at me like I was crazy. Where is the outrage?

I’ve seen coyotes jump a 5-foot fence without touching it. I’ve seen coyotes jump to the top of a 6-foot block wall in one bound and then walk along the top of it. Rollers are not the answer. They will just send coyotes to prey on someone else. We are past the point of these articles that seek to inform the public. The problem is getting worse. Why? Because nobody will do anything. Fish and Game won’t, Animal Control won’t and the police won’t. Coyotes are wild animals and as such come under the jurisdiction of Nevada Department of Wildlife. They should do something. Where is the outrage?

There won’t be any until a baby is carried off. What will NDOW say then? What will Animal Control say then? Is that what it will take for these people to stop saying, “There is nothing I can do?”

Chasing them off is not the answer. They have to be seriously thinned out, and there is only one way to do that.

— Thomas Papagna, Las Vegas

READER ARGUES COYOES WERE HERE FIRST

These coyotes have been on Earth longer than you have. Just as we live free so should they. Just like we kill chickens, cows or pigs for food to survive, so do they. We’re in the desert. Those coyotes have to search for food and water to survive, also. They don’t have money to go in the store and purchase a jug of water and meat and so on and so forth like we do. They don’t even have jobs. They don’t wake up and smell coffee; they wake up and smell their pack. Our animals that we have living with us did not always live with humans; they were not domestic like they are today. Animals have been here longer than us humans. Dogs, cats, etc. were free and wild, and so were we until a series of events happened that changed the world. Animals were meant to be free and stay free, not free and then domestic. If I was a puppy and got taken from my family and never saw them again, I would surely be heartbroken. Maybe we should walk in the feet of animals hunted, killed. Makes me sad how people look at the world as it is today. Everything that’s good is bad, and everything that’s bad is good, except for homicides and burglaries. I write from the heart.

— Nicole R. Wilkes, age 16, Las Vegas