FILE: A coyote pup takes a look around.
Carol Hamilton/IStockphoto via Getty
A monogamous pair of coyotes is preparing to raise new pups in their San Francisco den, leading to the partial closure of two popular trails.
On Friday, the Presidio Trust is set to close parts of the Park Trail and the Bay Area Ridge Trail to dog walkers until October.
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Conflicts with coyotes typically increase during pupping season, which runs roughly from spring until fall throughout the Bay Area.
“Coyote behavior is often misinterpreted during pupping season,” San Francisco Animal Care and Control spokesperson Deb Campbell wrote to SFGATE. “Parent coyotes can do some scary looking things to encourage dogs with people to move along. … This isn’t aggression so much as protective behavior. They just want dogs to move away from their pups.”
“Coyote behavior is often misinterpreted during pupping season,” San Francisco Animal Care and Control spokesperson Deb Campbell wrote to SFGATE.
Courtesy of Presidio Trust
Until this fall, when the pups will be finally big enough to venture out on their own, visitors won’t be able to bring their dogs, on- or off-leash, to the Park Trail between Mountain Lake and the Presidio Promenade or to the Bay Area Ridge Trail from Rob Hill Campground to the Presidio Golf Course.
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Conflicts with people are rare but not unprecedented. Issues with dogs, which coyotes see as threats to their young, are more common. “Escorting” refers to the phenomenon where a coyote follows people with dogs, hoping to shoo them away from their dens. San Francisco Animal Care and Control provides extensive advice for managing coyotes encounters, strongly advising hikers to put their dogs on leashes and keep their distance.
Phoebe Parker-Shames, wildlife ecologist for the Presidio Trust, told SFGATE that “mom is starting to scout some previous den site locations,” and residents near the golf course have seen the local canines more often recently — both indicators that the breeding pair is about to den.
“In the Presidio, we have two individuals, and this is their territory,” Parker-Shames said. “There is enough food that there could be more than a single breeding pair, but they won’t let another coyote establish a territory in their area. Any coyotes that are born in San Francisco, they either have to, you know, challenge an existing territory holder, or they need to disperse.”
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“In the Presidio, we have two individuals, and this is their territory,” wildlife ecologist Phoebe Parker-Shames said.
Courtesy of Presidio Trust
Coyotes, a native California species, returned to San Francisco in the early 2000s after their eradication, and their population grew. But numbers have likely plateaued in recent years, according to Tali Caspi, a postdoctoral researcher who has studied the city’s coyotes extensively. There are small local spikes every season right after the pups are born, she said, and before they are old enough to move away from their families.
“Pups are totally reliant on their mom and dad,” Caspi said. “We think of a lot of mammalian species just having the mom take care of the babies, and dad’s out of the picture, but coyotes are not like that. Parents mate for life, and both raise their offspring. They’re very, very invested parents.”
In addition to the Presidio Trust’s closing trails to dogs, other land managers will post signs to warn of coyote activity.
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On Angel Island, there is likely a family of 15 coyotes, all with the same mom, according to researchers there. But William Miller, an environmental scientist for California State Parks, told SFGATE that they have not observed any pups yet this year.
All trails within the San Francisco Recreation and Park Department’s more than 230 parks remain open at this time, despite pupping season. Some regional open spaces, such as Mount Tamalpais State Park, allow dogs on only one trail. The East Bay Regional Park District puts out safety messages about coyotes but does not initiate closures for them.
“Our park district is so massive, there’s just no way we would be able to close anything effectively because the coyotes are everywhere,” Jennifer Vanya, a spokesperson for the East Bay Regional Park District, told SFGATE. “Even in the urban interface areas, they’re in every inch of it.”
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Report encounters with coyotes to the Presidio Trust at 415-561-4270 or coyote@presidiotrust.gov, and alert SF Animal Care & Control to any observations in greater San Francisco. Learn more about coyotes during the Presidio Trust’s free community event on April 12 at the Crissy Field Center.