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Common across Utah, including in cities, and an opportunist that will eat almost anything.
Coyotes are common in Utah and adapt to a wide range of habitats, including inner cities and suburbs. Adults weigh 25 to 45 pounds and are gray to reddish with a cream belly, a long, slender muzzle, a bushy tail and triangular ears. Their usual calls are loud yips and short barking howls.
They eat small mammals, insects, reptiles, birds, carrion, grasses and fruit, and near homes they go for trash and pet food. Coyotes are mostly active at night but also hunt by day, and they get more active, vocal and territorial during mating, December to February, and while raising pups, April to July.
Coyotes are not usually dangerous to people unless they have lost their fear of them. Secure trash and pet food, keep dogs leashed, and bring small pets in at night. If one comes close, face it, shout, wave your arms and back away slowly; don't run.
North America's largest land animal, with wild herds on Antelope Island, in the Henry Mountains and in the Book Cliffs.
An open-country specialist with a white rump, unusual shedding horn sheaths and a need for connected habitat.
A Utah endemic whose short-grass colonies support a much larger community of grassland wildlife.