Yesterday I returned from a visit with Indiana Coyote Rescue Center. I was privileged to be there a couple of days with CeAnn and her intern, Jami. I am a wildlife rehabilitator from Michigan. I am one of the few rehabbers in southeast Michigan that takes coyotes. This summer a rehabber on the west side of Michigan contacted me about two coyotes that are too habituated to people to be released. I talked to Howell Nature Center and the Detroit Zoo, as I had had contacts with them before about wildlife. Neither could help.

This past year I have been very interested in learning as much as I can about coyotes. I read books, search the internet and find published research papers, and have attended the Ohio Wildlife Rehabilitators Association annual conference because there were two speakers about coyotes, Dr. Dan Burton of the Ohio Wildlife Center and Dr. Stan Gehrt who is conducting a study on coyotes in Chicago, Illinois. While there, I was referred to Dr. Jonathan Way in Massachusettes, who has been conducting a study on coyotes on Cape Cod for the past 10 years. I am going there in February to assist in trapping, radio collaring, and tracking coyotes. I hope to go back in the summer to assist with den monitoring.

While checking on the internet to find someone to help the rehabber with the two habituated coyotes, I found the Indiana Coyote Rescue Center. Wow, there was someone within driving distance from me that has coyotes!! I was hoping I could visit the ICRC to learn even more about these animals that are the most wild of the ones I come in contact with. I was very excited when my inquiring e-mail was returned that yes, I could visit, and yes, I could come that next week!

While I was at ICRC, I helped with cleaning pens, feeding, and watering. I spent a lot of time observing their behavior. Then CeAnn asked if I would like her to bring one of the coyotes in the house. What?? A coyote in the house?? That is just the opposite of what I do with wild animals! I am one of the few rehabbers that loves them to hate me, and that enjoys being growled at when I enter a pen. But I had already been educated as to what CeAnn does.

Her coyotes, all 20 of them, live outside in chain link enclosures with housing and places to hide. Occasionally some have to be attended to by her or her intern, and sometimes there is a vet visit and an operation. As CeAnn keeps them for their lifetime, she has to be able to work with them if needed. Some were kept by people as pets and for the usual reasons they couldn't keep them anymore. Most of these animals would have been euthanized if not for ICRC.

Then came the moment to bring the coyote in the house. On the outside I was cool and collected, but on the inside I was electrified. I was going to be in the same room as a coyote! It's one thing to save an adult from mange, or raise pups that came to me already weaned, or take older pups the DNR brought to me that someone had trapped and take them to release, but this was up close and personal.

I watched CeAnn and Jami go to a pen and carry in a young female. I couldn’t believe this moment! I work very hard to keep a great distance between me and the wild animals I treat so that they can be returned to the wild with as little interference from humans as possible. Even though I know that CeAnn’s work with these animals needs to be different from mine, I still feel that somehow I’m violating an unwritten law when I touch a wild animal, that I’m on their turf and I’m trespassing.

The gorgeous, blonde coyote named Artemis was now in the same room with me running around and sniffing everything. Then she came over to me. I was sitting down and she jumped up with her front paws and kissed my chin. Then she kissed my hands. Then my chin again! I held her as she did this. She was like an excited puppy with company over. What energy! I was elated, but also sad that this beautiful wild animal’s life was changed because someone’s wolf/dog hybrid brought it home, probably from the den. Thank God that there was a human being that cared enough about her to give her a second chance.

All of CeAnn’s coyotes will have a good life for as long as they live. She is completely devoted to giving all of them a chance to be healthy and outside. Her knowledge of coyotes is so great that even coyote researchers ask her for advice. We are very fortunate that she cares enough about these coyotes to devote her life to caring for them. I cannot imagine the hours and dollars she spends saving them from death, as that is what surely would have happened if she was not there. It always costs a lot to feed carnivores, and here is a person that has 20 adult ones to feed.

I have a lot of family obligations, but I hope to return this summer to help socialize puppies. I could get more coyote kisses!
- Holly Hadac

http://www.coyoterescue.org/n-picts.....inter-icrc.jpg ICRC Winter

http://www.coyoterescue.org/n-picts.....ly-artemis.gif Artemis passing out smooches to humans