Coyotes roam Alligator Hill; Incidents With Dogs Reported

By Jane Greiner
Sun staff writer
Mary Sutherland frequently walks her dog along the foot of Alligator Hill just off Forest Haven Road where she lives.
On a recent walk in the woods beside Forest Haven where the pavement ends, her son Bob’s dog, Mabel, bounded up the hill on its own even as her golden retriever, Molly, seemed reluctant to leave Mary’s side. Suddenly she saw Mabel from about 200 yards away, running down the hill toward her. Flanking Mabel were two “yellow dogs.”

Mary thought, “Look at the puppies” and figured they were all having fun until she realized that the yellow dogs were chasing Mabel, who was running flat-out.
Mary looked away to check on Molly and when she turned back the coyotes had disappeared. Mabel arrived at her side clearly terrified. Mary said “She drank water for an hour after that”.
Mary reports that her neighbor Patty Dingman’s dog Gracie will no longer go into the woods along Alligator Hill. They think she is afraid of the coyotes too.
Glen Arbor resident Paul May has seen what he believes are two coyote dens or one den with two openings on Alligator Hill. The holes are too big for fox dens. He didn’t actually see a coyote in the dens, but said, “I’ve seen plenty of coyotes while running on Alligator Hill”.
Glen Arbor veterinarian Roger Vander Werff of the Sleeping Bear Animal Clinic has not received any dogs with coyote bites this year but remembers four incidents in 2002. Two of them were quite large dogs, weighing 75 to 80 pounds, he said. “The owners saw it happen,” in two cases. Two of the dogs had been bitten on the rear and one on the back.
Vicki Baxter of Northwood Drive and Meagan Anderson of M-22 in Glen Arbor have seen coyotes on Alligator Hill several times this year while walking their dogs. Vicki recalls a coyote coming down the path along where they had just passed. They picked up their dogs and held them in their arms to protect them.
Another time “the coyotes came and nipped at the dog’s heal and I grabbed the dog,” to keep it away from the coyotes, she says. Vicki and Meagan claim they once saw and heard three coyotes. Vicki says that one is gray and two are brown and white. But they talked to another woman on the trail who had seen four. These coyotes allegedly came to within 15 feet of the women. They seemed more interested in the dogs and did not appear to be afraid of people.
The veterinarian assistant in Lake Leelanau said he had not heard of any coyote attacks on dogs but admitted, “of course, they always get some cats”.
The moral of the story is that we all need to remember that the wild things around us are truly wild. Their survival instincts are strong and they will take food where they find it, whether it’s from nature preserves, out of our gardens, or off our paths. It is up to us to keep an eye on our pets and remember that to a hungry coyote, a pet looks a lot like dinner.