Coyotes roam Diana Hansen’s five acres in Craftsbury, where she runs a Reiki healing business from a yurt behind her family’s farmhouse, but the shy creatures are a mostly invisible presence. Their yips and howls are “just a nice, beautiful sound to hear,” she said.
Then the hounds came. Early one Saturday morning in February, four or five hunting dogs with GPS tracking collars bounded through deep snow, barking and biting as they chased a frantic, bloodied coyote through Hansen’s yard. The hounds cornered the wild animal against Hansen’s greenhouse. Its tail broken and limp, the coyote ripped and clawed up the side of the enclosure, tearing the plastic walls in a desperate attempt to escape. Hansen saw it run down the road, the dogs just steps behind. She doesn’t know whether the coyote survived.
Hansen screamed for the hunters to keep their hounds off her land. “Go ahead and call the warden,” she said they replied. “He knows what we do.”
The next day, Hansen posted her story on Facebook and tagged two Vermont animal rights groups. “Enough is enough of this disgusting practice,” she wrote, vowing to do everything she could to outlaw the hunts. The post was shared widely and, with that, Hansen’s unwelcome brush with blood sport became a rallying point in the campaign to end Vermont’s open season on coyotes.
That campaign has been largely waged online, where it has been fueled by stories like Hansen’s and by images that capture the chase at its most grotesque. Activists have used social media to recast coyote hunting from pastime to perversion, sharing images of cornered animals, bloodthirsty hounds and piles of coyote carcasses that hunters posted proudly online.
“When they see the realities of what’s happening, that’s what causes people to take action,” said Brenna Galdenzi, president of the Stowe-based nonprofit Protect Our Wildlife Vermont.
But hunting advocates say the “realities” that wildlife activists depict online are actually a skewed image of the sport, which they consider an important part of the state’s outdoors culture.
Coyotes in Vermont, as in most states, have virtually no protections. They can be killed legally any time of year, in any number, by almost any method. The system works well for hunters, who tend to view coyotes as vermin that threaten the prey sportsmen favor, and whose unregulated killing is a pragmatic part of the rural way of life. In recent years, the species has attracted advocates who see coyotes as a misunderstood predator victimized by state-sanctioned barbarism.
Activists won a small but significant victory in 2018, when state legislators outlawed coyote-killing tournaments that gave prizes to the hunter who shot the most. Vermont was only the second state, after California, to ban the contests. But a subsequent push to enact limits on coyote hunting was rejected by the state’s Fish and Wildlife Board in June.
Still, activists believe they’ve neared a tipping point, citing a photo that prompted fresh outrage — and headlines — last month, when two decomposing pups were strung from a pole along a main road in Bloomfield.
“I think most people are compassionate and are horrified by coyote babies being tortured and hung outside somebody’s house,” said Jennifer Lovett of the Vermont Coyote Coexistence Coalition.
The Green Mountain State is one of 39 that allow year-round coyote hunting, according to the Vermont Fish & Wildlife Department. The “open season” policy dates back to the late 1940s, when coyotes moved eastward and entered the state from Canada after breeding with wolves. (The eastern coyote, which weighs up to 50 pounds, is larger than its western counterpart.) For decades, they were treated as threats to livestock and subjected to extermination campaigns.
The species remains poorly understood by the general public. A Vermont pro-hunting online petition with more than 10,000 signatures is peppered with calls to control their numbers so coyotes don’t harm populations of game, especially deer. It’s a double misconception, according to state wildlife biologist Kim Royar. While coyotes do sometimes take fawns, Royar said, research from other states has shown that they target prey that wouldn’t otherwise survive to maturity, meaning the effect is minimal.
Plus, hunting coyotes to control their population just doesn’t work. Coyotes have thrived nationwide despite relentless hunting, thanks to wily adaptations that stimulate breeding when a family group is threatened. Wildlife officials estimate that about 7,500 coyotes live in Vermont, a number that is unlikely to change substantially regardless of whether humans hunt them.
So what purpose does an open season serve? In 2017, state legislators asked Vermont Fish & Wildlife to explain its rationale, which resulted in a 16-page report penned by Royar. The report’s controversial, scientifically untested conclusion: Even though hunting coyotes doesn’t aid in population management, it may help keep the animals wary of humans, reducing conflict.
“Biologically, we do not have a coyote problem. What we have is a social problem,” Royar said in an interview last week, referring to the “polarizing” debate over coyote hunts. While some hunters are misinformed about their ability to reduce coyote populations, Royar said, activists’ focus on hunting policy also misses the far larger role that preserving habitat plays in the species’ health.
Activists contend that unregulated hunting actually increases coyote conflicts with humans, pets and livestock because it destabilizes family groups. But their outrage is also a moral one. Galdenzi criticized the state agency for being “complicit in these acts of reckless killing.” She described hunting coyotes with hounds as legalized “dog fighting” and likened stringing up their carcasses to “lynching.” If state officials cared about countering the “culture of intense loathing and hatred of coyotes,” they’d do more to educate hunters about their misperceptions, she said.
Instead, Galdenzi accused Vermont Fish & Wildlife of coaching hunters to take the sport “underground.” She pointed to a 2016 department newsletter that includes tips for how to pose photos of a kill so they can’t be used without permission to “give non-trappers a negative view of regulated trapping.”
Commissioner Louis Porter said his department put a similar message in a more recent publication to remind hunters that their online photos shape perception of the sport. The article’s first suggestion: “Display respect for the animal in its life and in its death.”
“I think people should always be aware of how their social media activity reflects on what they do and who they are,” he said.
The effect of social media on the coyote debate was front and center at the June meeting of the Fish and Wildlife Board, when members ultimately rejected a petition to limit coyote hunting.
“I feel like bad hunter behavior is responsible for the polarizing emotions that we have,” Caledonia County appointee Johanna Laggis was quoted on VTDigger.org as saying before she voted against new restrictions. “…Too bad we can’t legislate the use of social media, but we can’t.”
In an interview with Seven Days, Laggis said she was lamenting how viral images of unethical behavior have come to represent all hunters. “I personally feel like any hunting where you are bragging about killing something or torturing something isn’t really necessary to do,” she said. Most hunters don’t, Laggis added, and regulating coyote hunting is unlikely to stop the small minority who do.
The coyote coalition last year submitted to the legislature a montage of Facebook photos and comments that showed coyote hunters’ gleeful attitudes about their kills. One showed hound dogs surrounding a coyote that had fallen through ice. Several others depicted carcasses stacked in the beds of pickup trucks. Activists scour the social media platform to uncover the posts. Some use fake accounts to infiltrate hunting circles — a kind of “espionage,” Lovett said.
But the posts have become harder to find, as hunters fear becoming targets of online harassment should their photos end up on the coalition’s page.
Mike Covey, president of the Vermont Traditions Coalition, said the coyote activists are “beyond disingenuous” in their portrayals of the sport. “If you whip people’s emotions up, they don’t pause to consider the facts. The fact is that one individual did a distasteful act that nobody supports on any side of the coin,” he said, challenging Protect Our Wildlife to prove that the images of truckfuls of coyote carcasses were taken in Vermont, by Vermonters. Porter said he’s found one instance when activists used a photo from outside Vermont.
Covey and the commissioner also agree that it’s wrong to view the killing of coyotes as wasteful, even when their pelts aren’t used, because the activity still serves as a way for sportsmen to connect with nature.
“The argument that the only reason to hunt things is for meat, I don’t think, appreciates the full breadth of why people hunt,” Porter said.
One of the images that activists circulated online recently was a screenshot of a Vermont hunter’s Facebook post that showed a pile of at least nine coyote carcasses. Seven Days contacted the hunter whose name appeared on the post. The man, unaware that his name had been circulating, asked the newspaper not to identify him because the “antis” had harassed his friends with death threats.
“The ‘antis’ don’t understand it, and they don’t want to,” he said by phone. “They don’t want to hear our side of the story.”
After agreeing not to identify the man, a reporter sent him the Facebook post with his name on it. Was the photo of so many dead coyotes his? The hunter didn’t respond.
The original print version of this article was headlined “Tracking Coyote … Killers | Wily wildlife activists use provocative Facebook images to promote their cause”
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This article appears in The Animal Issue August 2019.
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Change needs to happen in the legislature to prevent extremist methods of mass killing. This is cruel and there is NO justification for allowing it to happen. I am appalled it continues just for bragging rights.
Killing an animal for food is hunting, killing an animal out of ignorance is mental illness. Neither is a ‘sport’.
F&W really needs to learn what traditional hunting is, the Abenaki have been here to ask the whole time.
We had a coyote attacked on our legally posted land on our front lawn by a pack of hounds. Everyone living here wants the coyotes here. We all have livestock and pets and are responsible owners, using electric fences and bringing pets in before dark, and want to coexist with wildlife. We asked the houndsmen not to hunt here with dogs, as we believe pitting a pack of 6 hounds against 1 random animal is animal abuse. In turn, the hunters killed all the foxes in the area and tossed them at the end of our driveway, stood in front of our house in the middle of the night with guns, chains and hounds, let their dogs loose repeatedly on legally posted land, etc. No animal should be hunted day and night, 365 days a year. No one should be hunting at night with night-vision equipment. Wildlife deserves a rest and landowners deserve to refuse animal cruelty on the land they bought and pay taxes on.
Show his face.
Great article! I find it beyond ironic that these coyote hunters call people who dont want to see a living sentient being killed for fun antis. They are the ones who are anti. anti-fact, anti-science, anti-progress, anti-ethics, anti-information. The fish and wildlife department has lost all credibility.
“Covey and the commissioner also agree that it’s wrong to view the killing of coyotes as wasteful, even when their pelts aren’t used, because the activity still serves as a way for sportsmen to connect with nature.”
This is the most ignorant statement I have heard that hasn’t come out of Washington DC. By this thinking ” killing of humans may not be wasteful because it serves as a way for sociopaths to connect with humanity!
It is obvious that only legislation by the legislature and / or the replacement of the Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife (The Department of Hunting and Trapping) and the Governor will bring sanity to the wanton waste thrill killing in Vermont.
The forest belongs to everyone, including hunters and trappers.
Hmmm, and here I was thinking reporting was supposed to be unbiased. Well, silly me. At the very least, Im happy that Seven Days reached out to a number of people on the pro-conservation side. It helped balance the otherwise heavy-handed nature of this article.
Its funny all the people who have a problem with it have never been coyote hunting with hounds but seemed to know everything about it. Only thing they know about it is a few pictures & some made up stories. Sad they have to lie & spread misinformation around to get their way. I dont see any of the activist giving up their vehicle to save animals lives so they dont mow them down on the highway.
Just because there is a couple bad apples in the bushel. Doesnt mean they all are bad.
Unless true hunters separate themselves from animal killers, hunters will face more posted land and more animosity from land owners. As a former deer hunter, I have no issues with hunters who kill for meat. But as a veterinarian, I have a problem with killing and injuring animals just for the fun of killing an animal. I have treated some of these victims. Some died. This constant killing needs to end NOW!
White hunters exterminate the Eastern Mountain lion,
white hunters exterminate the wolf in New England,
Now White hunters are attempting to exterminate coyotes.
Could there be a pattern here some where?
does anyone remember that scene in dances with wolves when the white hunters were laughing while shooting at the wolf?
That is the Vermont coyote hunter. If that bothers you,, Call your legislator.
Remember that scene in dances with wolves when the white hunters were laughing while shooting at the wolf?
That is the Vermont coyote hunter. If that bothers you as it should, call your legislator.
Covey and the commissioner [Porter] also agree that it’s wrong to view the killing of coyotes as wasteful, even when their pelts aren’t used, because the activity still serves as a way for sportsmen to connect with nature.
When no part of an animal is used, it is unequivocally wasted. Connecting with nature will never justify a life taken, especially for no necessary purpose. .
Question, Of you folks that claim to oppose hunting supposedly only coyotes, because it does not measure up to your higher morals, how many of you are “naturalized” Vermonters ? How many of you really are only against hunting coyotes and do not in reality,oppose all hunting ? Remember your “higher” morals now ! Also remember that a person that can lie to themselves and believe it has an idiot for an audience. Given this, why would one move to a place where they find so much of the culture abhorrent to them ? To educate and change the natives ? Thanks, but no thanks. This native does not want or need your “help”.
I would like to hear from our legislators and Governor Scott, as to why the RIGHTS of landowners to post their land is repeatedly being usurped and ignored by hunters exercising their PRIVILEGE to hunt, with NO accountability for trespassing on other Vermonters’ property? Why is their PRIVILEGE to hunt, paramount to landowners RIGHTS to protect their land? Should landowners be given the right to protect their property from incursion by these packs of dogs? Would a landowner by held accountable if they say, decided to get out their guns and shoot these dogs? Not that I’m in favor of shooting any dog, but if these unregulated ‘hunters’ have free-range over private property, what exactly is the landowners recourse?
I believe the only reason Porter is advising these ‘hunters’ to not post their barbarity online, is because it interferes with Governor Scott’s initiative to attract more people and businesses to relocate to Vermont. And these images of animal abuse, torture and death will turn off more potential residents than attract.
“I believe the only reason Porter is advising these ‘hunters’ to not post their barbarity online, is because it interferes with Governor Scott’s initiative to attract more people and businesses to relocate to Vermont.” If this is in fact true, I think we have found a way to control at least one of our “invasive species”.
This native does not want or need your “help”.
Native huh?
I have this tree in my yard, its called a crimson king Norway Maple. It has burgundy leaves from spring through fall, its a pretty tree. But every now and again, it drops a few seeds and new trees begin to grow.
So my question is, Are those new trees native?
Answer honestly, dont be afraid.
I read that piece good and hard to see where the author, Brouwer, found one coyote hunter to interview. Lazy and slanted reporting has become the expectation of 7-Days readers whenever hunting is the topic. Perhaps the sad part is that most Chittenden County writers like Brouwer don’t even know any real hunters– or Vermonters.
Geez, I’d prefer a Eurasian Milfoil analogy. If the milfoil were not allowed to set down roots, it would not be choking out the native species of freshwater aquatic plants, and I would be able to fish Magog without constantly pulling up my lines and cleaning them off.
I’m a hunter and hunting coyotes with hounds is legalized dog-fighting. No one sees what happens in the dead of winter where hound hunters operate, and unlike bears, raccoons or bobcats, coyotes can’t climb a tree to escape hounds. Also, hunting with the aid of GPS tracking collars, multiple four-wheel drive trucks and CB radios isn’t hunting, its unethical, unsporting and simply animal cruelty, yet this sport has become more and more common because of the spread of coyotes due to the lack of other extirpated native apex predators like the gray wolf. Coyote hound hunters are not true representatives of hunters in Vermont, and any responsible hunter should be opposed to a year round open season on any native wildlife.
You are a hunter ? OK. Let’s say that is factual. Are you against rabbit hunting with beagles ? As I remember being a former beagler, rabbits don’t climb trees either. What is next on your agenda ? Oh I forgot that has already been established, bear houndsmen…..
Ahh the good ole days, when if someone was doing something that you did not wish to partake in, you didnt. If some one believed in something you did not, they were allowed to continue in their belief, and you allowed to disagree without fear of retaliation. You were probably smart enough to do the home work to find out about your possible future neighborhood, and the culture before you moved there, and then expected them to conform to your beliefs. If you dont like loud noise, you dont build your house next to a rifle range. If you dont like hunting, you dont move to the country, where that culture runs deep. Ahh the good ole days !
Ah X-Road! Oh for the good old days when slavery was the norm. Fortunately those who opposed it did not just ignore it!
Those who keep saying that only natives are smart enough and allowed to voice opinions better all be Native Americans and not just descendant imposters from Europe etc.
BLOOD LUST. NOT EVEN CLOSE TO SPORTING BEHAVIOR.
Wow ! Comparing sportsmen & women to slave owners ! That’s rich ! (and looney!) Me thinks me hit a flat nerve !
Blood lust ? Blood sports ? Whatever, but I prefer “Hunting, The original extreme sport” LOL
X-Road, you mentioned in your post about “the good ole days”…..you forget that everyone remembers those days. You feel people that don’t stem back generations are trying to change this State? I beg to differ. You see, we moved here because the area where we had roots changed with massive development. With that development, our country life seized to exist anymore. City people thought they were living in the country because they had a half acre manicured yard, but God forbid if a deer or rabbit ate their expensive piece of landscaping….have someone kill it!! Outsiders don’t want anything here to change. We love to look out our windows or go outside and share our property with wildlife because we saw with our own eyes that it can be gone tomorrow. It is people like this psychopath in the picture killing every coyote he comes across that is changing Vermont. No one should have the right to exterminate a species because they don’t like it. This is a coldhearted individual that is not mentally sound. Unfortunately, the Dept of Fish and Wildlife needs a complete overhaul, starting with Commissioner Porter.
You have to accept that your family may go back generations, but Vermont doesn’t belong to you.