The viral visit caused several neighbours, Toronto police, a parking enforcement officer and a tow truck driver to gather around the home
A coyote pup walked into a Christie Pits home on Tuesday morning and took a nap in the homeowner’s bed. It did not, however, sit on any chairs or eat any porridge.
Alice Kent, a resident of the neighbourhood, posted about the incident on social media, triggering thousands of reactions from locals.
She told TorontoToday she left her front door open on the day of the nap-and-enter as she waited for the arrival of her house cleaner.
Unbeknownst to her, a coyote walked through the door and snuck up the stairs into the primary bedroom — a scene the cleaner later discovered.
“I think there is a fox in your room,” Kent recalled the cleaner telling her. It was in fact a coyote, covered in feces and urine.
Kent said she had been in contact with the Toronto Wildlife Centre — a charity that provides rescue, veterinary care and rehabilitation for sick, injured, and orphaned wild animals — for previous coyote sightings in the area. She said three coyote pups went into her back deck only last week and burrowed under a shady daybed with a canopy.
Thinking that the Toronto Wildlife Centre would take awhile to arrive due to the amount of calls the organizations receives each day, Kent said she immediately closed her bedroom door and decided to call Toronto police — who were reluctant to come.
“They said it’s not something they do,” Kent said. “I think because it was a coyote, it was such a new problem.”
Nevertheless, officers did show up. Police spokesperson Stephanie Miceli told TorontoToday that officers responded to an animal complaint around 11 a.m. in the Bloor Street West and Christie Street area.
Kent said the first officers to show up didn’t have the equipment or training to deal with coyotes. “It’s not their job, but you know, I was happy to have any people there to help me think through what our options are.”
The news quickly spread. Kent said neighbours, a parking enforcement officer, roofers working on the street and even a tow truck driver soon showed up.
The tow truck driver told Kent that members of Toronto Wildlife Centre were just up the road catching other coyotes and quickly ran back to flag them down.
Some neighbours then grabbed their ladder to get on to Kent’s roof to see if the coyote was becoming agitated or aggressive. But to Kent’s delight, the pup was just resting and there were no issues — other than the feces, urine and little bit of blood scattered across her bedroom.
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Neighbours brought over a ladder to Alice Kent’s home to check on the coyote pup. Supplied: Alice Kent
Nathalie Karvonen, the executive director of Toronto Wildlife Centre, said coyotes in the neighbourhood are suffering from sarcoptic mange, which is a contagious skin disease caused by mites that burrow under the skin.
The coyote pup was “easily rescued” and treated on scene for mange before being released back into the care of its family, Karvonen said, adding that it was “as hard as it would be to get your cat out from under your bed.”
Kent said that while the coyote was “really cute,” she purchased a screen door on Wednesday morning.
Signs of a bigger problem?
“A normal wild coyote in a million years would never walk in a home,” Karvonen said. “They just simply are very, very afraid of people, and they want to stay away.”
Kent said she has lived in the area for 30 years and that her family keeps the door open quite often to air out their home.
While it is common to witness coyotes in nearby parks or late at night, a spotting of a coyote in her home is something else entirely, Kent said.
“Never have I seen one on my street or in my yard or on a front porch or anything like that,” she said.
Karvonen said coyotes should be nowhere near people or their homes and believes members of the community are feeding the local coyotes.
It is likely what made the coyote pup feel comfortable enough to walk through Kent’s front door, she said. “We know 100 per cent that these coyotes are being fed by people, which causes huge problems because it changes their behavior.”
Karvonen suggested that when people come across coyotes, they use aversive conditioning, which is a behavioural treatment that reduces unwanted behaviour based on positive punishment.
Waving hands, making noise and clapping hands are an easy way to enforce aversive conditioning on the wild animals, especially since bigger coyotes are only around 30 pounds, a smaller size than most people think, she said.