Also one of our four-legged relatives…
“Stop senseless slaughter of Pennsylvania coyotes” : Letters to the editor
Coyotes, greatly revered by Navajo herders, who call them “God’s dog,” are tragically the most persecuted and demonized predator in Pennsylvania. Throughout Pennsylvania, coyotes are being brutally slaughtered in killing contests for money. They have the same DNA as our beloved dogs, and one would go to jail for killing a neighbor’s dog. It is bad enough they are tortured, but some cruel, bloodthirsty hunters use hound dogs. Typically hunters will wound coyotes in the leg areas, so the hounds can easily catch up with them, and the hounds tear them apart.
Coyotes are not killed because they are a nuisance, as claimed. They are killed to keep the deer populations high, so the sport and trophy hunters, a small 6 percent minority of Pennsylvanians, will have an excess of deer to kill during hunting season.
Coyotes serve important natural roles as scavengers and predators, controlling rodents, killing fawns and keeping deer populations in check. The Pennsylvania Game Commission and hunters always say that their services are necessary to reduce the deer population because the deer have no natural predators. However, coyotes are deer predators, so why are they trying to slaughter all of the coyotes in Pennsylvania?
For more information go to www.projectcoyote.org.
— Silvie Pomicter, Chinchilla