Outdoor Wisconsin host Dan Small, also Editor of Wisconsin Outdoor News, keeps an eye on Wisconsin's great outdoors. In this month's column, Dan looks at the coexistence of wildlife and humans in our urban areas.

Urban Wildlife Close Encounters

by Dan Small

The closest I've ever been to a live coyote on the loose was in my front yard. I was mowing the half-acre of lawn that sprawls from the house to the Milwaukee River one afternoon seven years ago, when a dog trotted out of the woods and angled across the yard. It passed within 20 feet of my riding mower and, without breaking stride, disappeared into the brush on the other side of the yard, just as I realized the "dog" was in fact a coyote. It appeared in good health and paid no attention to me at all. In the winter, I'd occasionally seen coyote tracks in the woods that surround the house, and I'd frequently seen their tracks on winter hunts in southern Ozaukee County since the early 1980s, but this was the first time I'd seen one out in broad daylight.

Now, people are seeing coyotes in the metro area all the time, and some folks want them controlled so they don't eat their wayward pets. It seems the abundant green space provided by county parks, coupled with miles of river corridor and undeveloped Lake Michigan shoreline, have offered the opportunistic coyote a chance to get a foothold right in town, and he's making himself at home. Sound familiar? Deer and Canada geese have followed essentially the same scenario, although their presence creates slightly different problems. Deer eat ornamental shrubs, flowers, fruit trees and vegetable gardens, and they jump in front of our vehicles. Geese foul parks, golf courses and waterfront lawns with their droppings.

A number of southeastern Wisconsin communities are working to control the burgeoning deer herd. Deer have been livetrapped and relocated, and now they're being shot by sharpshooters. Let up these efforts for one year and the deer population will jum