I had a shep/dobe who would bound thru the woods,bouncing high
enough to see over the brush, tail up, which was white underneath,
and in the blur of motion with poor light, looked very much like a
deer moving thru the woods. Not only can it happen by accident, but
happens nearly every year.

Just a couple of weeks ago, both the owner and a gsd were shot dead. It's only prudent to stay out of the woods during firearm deer season, for safety's sake.

As for coyote, most hunters consider them vermin, and wouldn't think twice about shooting one. They thrive in all 84 counties in MI, even Wayne, metro Detroit, inspite of trapping and hunting. While it might make us sad to see any canine dead, fact is a pelt is worth some cash, and it's legal fur trade, as it has always been. Not my cup of tea, but it is what it is.

 Quote: Mike Sanchez

The fact is, it's not a coyote problem at all, there are just too many people. We've pushed ourselves into their territory. And now, they're forced to share their turf with us. But because we carry guns, I guess we get the last word...

Mike,

Do a little googling and you'll learn that coyotes have expanded their range as we humans expanded our's into North America. There are more coyotes in the United States today than when the constitution was signed. One of the reasons the coyote population has expanded into urban areas is that we leave all kinds of tasty food around for them in the form of garbage. We haven't pushed them out of their habitat so much as they've found our habitat inviting and have moved in.

However,unsuited the dog was for police service work,does not excuse the responcibility of the handler,or the deer hunter. The handler who was responcible for the dog should not have put his dog in jeoparty, and the deer hunter should have identified his target prior to shooting. The problem was not the dogs fault,who paid with his life,it's irresponcible actions by the people involved. I don't see the correlation between shooting the K-9, and the killing of coyotes,wolves,or dogs running in the woods. Deer hunters need to kill deer, not dogs, coyotes, wolves, or people. Where I live they have shot each other out of tree's, and we have had several homocides, which occurred over something as simple as a tree stand. I think we may ought to re-evaluate who we allow to take a high-powered rifle, and turn lose in the country-side.I certainty don't think a hunting license gives one the right to kill any animal that crosses their path, simply for the joy of killing. Mark Twain once abserved that,"Man is the only animal that kills for pleasure."

I guess this “Redneck” is sorry that I side tracked this thread from the true subject of the post (i.e. the instability of the diseased dog). With that being said, I do not apologize for my views on coyotes. If you have a problem with my view then I guess that tells me how little you know about hunting/ conservation. Talk to a farmer, ranch owner, that has problem with yote’s and I am sure you might change you tune.

Mark Twain once observed that,"Man is the only animal that kills for pleasure."
I guess the validity of this statement would depend on if you believe that man is indeed an “animal”. Sure biologically we are mammals but are we really the same as animals…I don’t think so!!! Regardless there are species of animals that kill and do not eat their kill so Twain’s statement really is invalid.

Dan Oas wrote "Just a couple of weeks ago, both the owner and a gsd were shot dead. It's only prudent to stay out of the woods during firearm deer season, for safety's sake."

I saw this and NO ONE WAS ABLE TO IDENTIFY WHERE IT HAPPENED OR WHO THE BEAD GUY AND FIDEO WERE. This sounds to me ike a PETA BS Line to me.

It comes under the category of "NEVER LET THE FACTS GET IN THE WAY OF A GOOD STORY"

Charley Snyder sent me this link -

http://www.qctimes.com/articles/2006/11/21/news/local/doc4562a35b267e1564123953.txt

Looks like I was wrong. The guy who did this should be charges with manslaughter. There was a 15 year old boy killed ion MN this gun season - they charged him with manslaughter. The person that did this needs to go to jail for awhile.

that is asad story... but evry sad story can teach you how to privent the next one...
my i.d.f unit had an excident that remind the ones above -
max an 2 years old medium malinois send at acertain routin training and as he where about 250 meters from hes handler agun shot was heard and the dog fall to the ground the handler and the force with him of course trace the shooting point and allmost killed the poor hunter that thouth the dog where ajakcle.(he was after arabis suspected jackle) the dog died before the force reached it...
asad story but we pot our mind to it- we hade preform training at ahunting area and arabis infected area and we made some regulation we called tham "max regulations"
and from that day forwerd we had conected the rangers and hunters clubs and scatter info pages of our training areas and the looks of malinois and gsds and how the can recognized and each time we where of to field we had conected the rangers of thos areas
of all of our training fields and noted tham we are at training
thos regulations helped to prevent lots of similar and diffrent
excidents.
now days im off duty and service but still on the field with my dogs and each time ireach to anew teritory im still perform the "max regulations" and conetect all the forces and authoritys
that may be ahazard or relevant to the issue...
sory for truble you guys with that story and my bad english but lets us all learn from thos sad storys and prevent the next ones-
our jobs of most of us is dangerus enogh on operative missions lets make our training and routine safe...

One clarification for the person that posted that the reason coyotes are expanding their territory is due to human garbage. That's not exactly true. It may be a reason that the coyotes are moving into the cities, but they don't just eat garbage they eat small prey animals and yes puppies, small dogs, small children and cats fall into that catagorie. The main reason that the coyote population has exploded in the last century is due to the fact that the coyote has only humans for enemies. In the past when wolves roamed most of the U.S. they killed all coyotes on site. The coyote was basically a threat to the wolves food sources and were chased down and killed. Used to be you mainly saw a single coyote but these days I have seen them running in packs on numerous occasions. I have seen them hampering cattle during the calving season in packs. Coyotes are a big problem here in Montana and are most always shot on site.

So just to set things straight, it isn't 'the garbage' that has caused the explosion of the coyote population, but the lack of enemies. And by all means if you want less coyotes then I suggest you do what we have done in the Northwest and re-introduce wolves.

Well, the dog was only 16 months old, so really he was still immature, not seasoned. It could be he spooked at the noise or perhaps it was the noise in conjuntion with something else. I doubt they would have used the dog if he had previously spooked at gunfire. I still question why they were using a dog without a solid recall. Could this have happened during a training excersize?

Don't know. The second newspaper story says that it was at 10 pm & just says that they were walking & fireworks from the neighbour's house scared the dog.