Coyote vocals=litter size

Rumor has it, that when coyotes howl at night and they don’t get any response it triggers a gizmo in them to cause higher litter amounts...thus making coyote killing worthless......

First off I call bs because I cannot locate any studies to support this. But I guess a book called coyote America by dan Flores talks about it and also the meat eater guy talks about it also.

So what’s the deal is it just anti propaganda or is there a truth. If true I’d like to know where to find the study.

I don’t have any facts to back it up, but I believe it’s true. I think litter sizes are affected in all animals based on how many of them there are in an area.
Probably goes down to the stress of the female that decides the litter size. More competition = more stress = more fighting = smaller litters.

Could be true, a lot of studies support the idea of the populations increase and decrease with the prey population

I would think the weight, age, stress level and overall condition of the mother coyote would be the primary determiners of litter size. It would not greatly surprise me if there was an auditory cue that helps determine litter size too, but I think it's unlikely. I have never read a study that says coyotes use an auditory cue to determine litter size.

If I had the financial backing, I would love to do a study and project on coyotes. I would have to get the state and a university to cooperate first.

I just questioned two Ohio coyote breeders on coyote breeding and behavior, one on Sunday and one on Monday.

Keith

I tend to agree with Kieth on this. To me it is the most logical explanation. Imagine the same mother on yrs where her cut of the carrying capacity of the land is bountiful. She could make lots of pops and there would be enough game for all to theoretically survive. Imagine the contrast of her in poor condition barely surviving. He body would tend to produce fewer eggs.

In cattle a less than perfect body condition results in breeding back later and later but we men have taken great measures to manipulate their genetics. Coyotes are still survival of the fittest.

The cynical side of me imagines this is brought to you by the same ppl who say coyotes only eat mice. (SMDH)

If I remember correctly...

Coyotes are density specific breeders. I believe this is a characteristic that is not shared by all animals.

I think I read this in Mark June's book....I'm pretty sure of it and it was full of excellent info. There most certainly is plenty published on the subject. I always thought Mark's book was priceless

I have heard for years the more you take out of the population the bigger the litter sizes get. I don't know what triggers it but seems to be true.

MNCedar I should read that book. If what June writes is correct a by product would be how often and in what number vocalizations are returned a byproduct of what is really taking place.


It would be almost as obvious a mistake as studying the extinction of the woolly mammoths as the ice age ended and coming up with the idea climate change isnt natural but instead caused by aerosol cans and engines that burn fossil fuels. LMBO at scientists who cannot think for themselves.

I remember I worked over Mark and Slim’s books with highlighters like I was studying for a test

Or changing the old example, like saying eating more ice cream during the Summer makes the weather hotter because there is a positive correlation between the two.

Keith

I had heard this theory also , there was a guy on a Joe Rogen's pod cast playing in the carpool last year and the guy said it was unique to coyotes and this is why wolves could be wiped out of an area but coyotes could not. Well 150 years ago there were wolves in Indiana and no coyotes , now no wolves and lots of coyotes.

I think that would only hold true if the habitat could support higher numbers.
Also, with larger litter sizes one would expect a greater absolute number of pups to die early assuming that the RATE of mortality remained the same. In the end, the overall population ..going into trapping season should be about the same.

In wolves, pack size is directly related to habitat and available prey. I would think it's the same for coyotes. A population should be able to sustain significant harvest as long as the breeding pair is not harvested.

As far as coyotes increasing reproduction based on vocalization............I don't think I'd put a lot of reliability on that. It may be an additive indicator but I think others would be better.

I suspect they can tell about how many critters are on the landscape by visual and olfactory cues. They must see each other and certainly see and smell scats and scent posts. I would think these for better clues than howling.

But the bottom line would be...is there enough to eat ? The bigger the pack, the less each mouth gets to eat.

The other thing that we have no way to measure is immigration. A pack may increase by dispersal from an adjacent population. We wouldn't know whether the increase was from bigger litters or more immigration.

I always thought it had to do with feed. Domestic dogs have big litters when females are in cages that are side by side by side at a breeder for the pet market. They get fed well. Never miss a meal. You kill a bunch the ones left eat better and easier.

Kiethc where is the profit in breeding coyotes?

The breeder I talked to in Dayton on Monday has not even had the coyote pups conceived yet and took deposits selling them for $500.00 each for pets. She stopped taking deposits in just a few days. This is her 4th year doing it.

The other breeder I talked to is planning to sell their coyote pups for $600.00. They want to buy a crossbred pup from Katie, my coyote and my dog Eli for $1000.00. I am a little worried that Eli may be to old to breed. He's around 12 or 14 years old.

There is a proven coyote, German shorthair pair online right now for $3000.00. They had pups online last year, that looked lime black German shorthairs for $2000.00 and then reduced to $1200.00 for the last 2.

https://www.exoticanimalsforsale.net/search

Keith

There are so many variables at play, especially for the potential of wild animal progeny. There’s no way you could cite one thing as making bigger litters, except more food. All animals of a certain species have some variance of breeding ability. Then take into account how many offspring reach maturity. All Moms are not created equal. Not in fertility, not in birthing ability and not in rearing ability.

they must have different coyotes than we do if those pups stay gentle

There was a biologist (I forgot his name) on Predator Masters years ago that explained the more you kill the bigger the litter size is not some miracle from mother nature. It has everything to do with population dynamics of the female. Howling or lack thereof would have no affect on litter size either.

The jist of his explanation is that a heavy harvest on a population of coyotes in an “area” would typically kill more younger female coyotes, thus leaving more older females than younger females to be bred. Older females on average have less pup mortality than young of year female coyotes, so it would appear that the litter size increases when you kill off a lot of coyotes, when in reality the female coyotes that survived the harvest were actually just better at raising/keeping pups alive. In the circumstance that there isn’t a heavy harvest, more young of the year female coyotes would get bred and have litters, but due to their inexperience/ability to mother it would appear the overall average litter size in that area decreased. When you just have more younger female coyotes having pups and not being able to raise them like an older experienced adult coyote.

I hope that explanation makes sense, it does to me. I can relate it to my experience raising ranch fox. If I had an option to have 20 female fox, Id much rather have 3-4 year old females who have all raised a litter every year, than to have 20 young of the year 1st time females. I’d bet a lot on the older female group weaning a larger average litter size than the pup female group. Just my 2 cents.

I'm thinking If you really want to find out at least one piece of the puzzle you could go out in NOV and trap coyotes. Pair up about 20 pairs of male and female. Collect urine till the middleof Dec. to help pay for it all and acclimate the coyotes to cages.. Full feed for half the pairs, and the other pair gets full feed every 4th day. A good brand of dog food when collection is finished. Of course when the pups are born what do you do with them? I could not in good conscience tell somebody they will be pets and sell them. I guess when the pups get their eyes open you could release all of them.

I always snicker at the “leaving some for seed” comment when it comes to coyotes. People down here have been trying to rid the landscape of them since they first arrived. One might think he’s wiped out the population in an area, but the following year other coyotes have filled in the gap.
Less competition will bring on more heavier litters. Mother Nature will take care of itself with coyotes. I took 15 off a place last year until I couldn’t even find a track or any pics on the game cams. The place is now crawling with them again.
I could see where a howl with no answer could trigger a coyote to have an increased litter. Especially in an area with an abundance of food.

I've always thought it was more of a function of more food = greater survivability of the pups.

The pressure/howl theory demands that the females know there is pressure or that they don't have neighbors.

If correct, Why hasn't cattle and sheep ranchers put electronic howlers every 5 miles or so, Play them at night Jan.1st through April 1st. Couple- three years the coyote population should be in check.

Bingo.

I agree

From what I've seen of the collared coyote studies, the young of the year coyotes will travel a surprising distance to find new stomping grounds. One of the collared pups travelled up and over the mountains in Kalispell to Browning. I thought I remember seeing a link on here where a coyote in SC travelled 100 miles before it was killed. Like most people have said litter size has to relate to coyote density and food availability.

I wouldn't believe what I hear on Joe Rogan's podcast from the self proclaimed "wildlife biologists". Most of them are reality TV type people.

Danny was not your coyote really well behaved until one time, when in it was older, it badly bit your wife, when it was startled with a garden hose? How old was your coyote when it bit her.

People keep all sorts of fairly to very dangerous animals as pets. There originally were no domesticated animals.

There is probably a tremendous amount of different genetics in coyotes. I heard Embark is doing free DNA tests on captive coyotes. If so, I am going to get Katie DNA tested. I suspect most Eastern coyotes have a fair amount to high amount of domestic dog DNA.

I am especially curious about the DNA of the coyotes that are living in cities right now.

Keith

This makes perfect sense.

You took the words right out of my mouth.

The theory would be easy to test with automatic howlers around an area . Im not willing to say total BS but am skeptical .
The amount of anxiety that females of all species feel have an effect on fertility , successfull gestation to term ,
And raising their young to weaning . What may cause anxiety varies from one species to the next . As much anxiety as coyotes express could lead sombody to theorize that coyotes might be susceptible to these stresses .
Myself I think it would take more than howling . I think most coyotes would get used to the constant howling without olfactory confirmation and possibly conflict much as they get used to a dog on a chain jut staying out of their reach.
Another thought is how successfully will female coyotes settle if they dont have a home territory established at time of their heat cycle

litter size or weaned litter size? two very different things.......there is a ton of research done on this if someone just wants to read

I have read something similar just not with the vocalization part but I'm sure that this would be a part of the que. Other animals have similar reactions to population. A whitetail doe will continue to fawn more does when the buck v doe ratio is out of whack in favor of does.

I dont think anybody is doubting that litters are bigger when there are fewer coyotes what people are doubting is that this is due to vocal cues instead of other more obvious factors . Has anybody seen the studies where this theory comes from . I wonder if its rooted in them studies where they took census of the population by counting the answers to a siren at different stations at set times . It sure makes for a good story . I heard a radio comercial today for an MDC blog talking about the SENSATIONAL adaptability of the coyote

Coyotes at the farm here are exceptionally quiet this fall and winter. Still numbers of them but real quiet bunch. Last three or four years just the opposite.

More calling pressure this year?