Question 2: Was their natural population check the wolf?

Coyotes natural predators were the wolf, cougar and bobcat. However, there are other natural factors that also keep the population in check. We know that availability of prey (rodents, mice voles, rats, rabbits, squirrels) determines the coyote population within an area. When there is an abundance of prey, litters tend to be larger. When prey is scarce, litters tend to be smaller. Population is also limited by the dispersal of the pups at about 10 months of age. At this time they must leave their home territories to find territories of their own, sometimes traveling hundreds of miles to do so. Less than 50 percent survive that journey. A combination of hunters, automobiles, distemper, parvo-virus, and starvation (from competition with other migrant coyotes) lead to the majority of these deaths. These factors: hunters, cars and disease, also impact the natural population within a given home range. Another factor that controls population involves the fertility cycle. Male coyotes, unlike dogs which are fertile year-round, are only fertile once a year. This cycle begins approximately a month before the female coyote comes into estrus in about January. In Indiana, pups are born towards the end of March. Cold weather and snow during the first few weeks of the pup's life affects their survival rate. During the time immediately following the birth of the pups, the female depends on the male for food, as she does not leave the pups during the first two weeks. If anything happens to the male from the conception of the pups until two weeks after they are born, the pups will generally not survive, as the mother has no source for her own nutrition without the male and therefore cannot take care of the pups.