
New species combining wolf, coyote, and dog emerges in eastern North America - anishkothari
http://www.economist.com/news/science-and-technology/21677188-it-rare-new-animal-species-emerge-front-scientists-eyes?cid1=cust/ednew/n/bl/n/20151029n/owned/n/n/nwl/n/n/NA/n
======
blisterpeanuts
One outcome of this interbreeding is that these animals have lost their fear
of people, but they retain their predatory instincts, making them quite
dangerous.

There are coyotes in the northern part of Nova Scotia that have attacked lone
hikers. A woman was killed, in fact a few years ago, and there have been
numerous scary encounters in which the animal creeps closer and closer to a
wary human, much like a predator approaching its prey.

The coyotes in this part of Canada are said to have interbred with dogs; it's
not clear that these are the wolf-coyote-dog hybrids described in the article,
but anyway these animals harassing hikers have been hanging out in the
forested national park, as wolves would do.

Park rangers have tried to control the population, with varying results.
Simply shooting a few of the coyotes actually can backfire; it seems to
stimulate larger litters to replenish the population.

We might have to return to the pioneer approach of shooting them on sight, and
hope this instills a healthy fear of humans as they once had. It's good having
them around, because they control the rodent population which is a vector for
disease bearing ticks and other problems. We just don't want them stalking our
children in the local park.

~~~
bleakcabal
Coyotes have only killed two people in North America in all of recorded
history (and if you check recorded history for wolf attacks it goes back at
least to the 1800s).
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coyote_attacks_on_humans](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coyote_attacks_on_humans)

A 3 year old child in 1981 and a 19 year old woman in 2009. Both victims were
alone at the time of their attacks. Coyotes killing humans is an exceedingly
rare occurrence.

~~~
crpatino
You cannot make sense of an emerging phenomenon by looking at century old
records of superficially similar phenomena.

The 3 year old case sounds like an outlier, regular coyotes getting at an
unprotected child.

The case of the 19 year old may be the canary on the coal mine. A fully grown
adult should have scared off the coyotes, but that's not how it happened. We
should be asking what was different in this case and why the expectations were
not met.

~~~
bleakcabal
I don't see how you can call 1 case an emerging phenomenon. More over that
there haven't been any other cases since.

I don't think we should be afraid, as the OP mentioned, of coyotes stalking
our children in the parks because of one isolated incident.

~~~
crpatino
> I don't see how you can call 1 case an emerging phenomenon. More over that
> there haven't been any other cases since.

It is really easy, you start with one model of reality, then a piece of
evidence comes that does not seem to fit the model.

The first step is to formulate hypothesis that explain that gap between the
theory and the practice. Normally, the next step would involve gathering
evidence that disproofs each hypothesis, and whichever you cannot disproof, it
is the real explanation (which either will confirm your model or provide raw
material to refine). Since I have no strong incentive to investigate this
particular cases, I will just let be.

However, what I pointed out in my first comment is this: If you brush under
the carpet every piece of evidence that do not seem to fit your model, you
will end up with a broken model and a very bumpy carpet.

~~~
kenbellows
> you start with one model of reality, then a piece of evidence comes that
> does not seem to fit the model

This is not emergence of a new phenomenon, this is an outlier[0]. There are
always outliers. Claiming that a new phenomenon is emerging necessarily
implies multiple data points to distinguish it from isolated statistical
anomalies, which will otherwise be regarded as simple outliers caused by
factors isolated to that incident.

There's an important difference between "brushing under the carpet evidence
that does not seem to fit your model" and simply regarding such evidence,
tentatively and in the short term, as an expected statistical anomaly until
there is sufficient data to recognize a trend. There is no trend here, and
until there is, it is completely reasonable to treat isolated incidents as
outliers.

0:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outlier](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outlier)

------
rwhitman
In eastern Los Angeles, coyotes are _everywhere_ , to the point where in some
areas you run into them constantly day or night. They're stealthy - silent and
very calculating. You can tell many of them are part domestic dog and they
don't seem phased by proximity to people and appear to understand the workings
of the city to some extent. I have seen the mentioned looking both ways when
crossing roads, and also use of sidewalks.

Coyotes are very good at not calling attention to themselves when needed. In
fact I lived next to a den of them in LA for years and never heard a peep,
despite seeing them staking me out from my neighbor's roof in broad daylight,
testing the perimeters of my house more than a few times.

The thing is they're smarter than we give them credit, adapting to the man
made environment and expand territory very quickly. We talk about controlling
their population but they can parry - adeptly skilled at out-maneuvering
people. Hold eye contact and you realize even though they look like a little
dog, they're not your friend - they're studying you.

The speed at which they're expanding territory and where they're headed on the
East coast now, is interesting. Growing up in southeastern Pennsylvania we
never saw coyotes really, but in the last few years I'm hearing lots of
stories about them from family. And now even here in NYC they're making an
appearance as well.

The coyote / dog mix in LA seemed to not only have adapted to urban areas but
use it to their advantage. Now add wolf to the mix and drop them in the
environs of bountiful woodland and endless suburban sprawl of the eastern
seaboard, what happens?

If an apex predator were to adapt into becoming an anthropocene survivor
species, a prerequisite would be having intelligence enough to outwit humans.
A species partly forged in human company, with increased intelligence, that
uses our own environment as an advantage, and can hunt and eat us. Oh and
reach full maturity in about a year. They may seem cute now, but give them a
few generations and they might not be so cute any more.

~~~
robbrown451
If they are really as stealthy as you say, the last thing they will do is be
aggressive toward humans.

From an evolutionary perspective, I can't imagine a worse strategy than
hunting and eating humans.

~~~
creshal
> From an evolutionary perspective, I can't imagine a worse strategy than
> hunting and eating humans.

Being an aphrodisiac according to traditional Chinese medicine probably tops
that.

------
codezero
Check out _Nature: Meet the Coy-wolf_ if you have Netflix (presumably in the
US only)

Also, available here:
[http://video.pbs.org/video/2365159966/](http://video.pbs.org/video/2365159966/)
(not sure if region restricted, sorry)

This page has a bunch of other resources:
[http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/coywolf-meet-the-
coywolf/8605...](http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/coywolf-meet-the-
coywolf/8605/)

~~~
pbhjpbhj
Region restricted to me in UK. However there's this "news" report on the PBS
doc being made,
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sd18fLEf_Cw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sd18fLEf_Cw)
which includes excerpts.

------
mhartl
In a parallel development, a hybrid pigeon, hawk, and roadrunner—the
"pigeawkrunner"—has emerged in the same environments as the coywolf. Reports
that the coywolf's attempts to catch the pigeawkrunner frequently backfire,
resulting in deadly if amusing rock-falls, are as yet unsubstantiated.

~~~
posnet
I saw that story, I think it was on the same site that had the piece on the
Midwest entrepreneur who recently closed a successful round A for his
oversized magnet company.

~~~
lifeisstillgood
That's the company that the WSJ described as "profits that seemed to hang in
the air, before falling off a cliff"?

Associated Coyote Magnetic Enterprises - was that the name? What was their
stock symbol?

~~~
chiph
They have really diversified in recent years, making lateral moves from
blacksmithing tools to large-diameter springs, and then into rocketry. They
truly are a company that makes everything.

------
iamthepieman
used to go out with two of my brothers in the fields near our house in
northern Vermont. The grass was chest height on a full grown man with some
shorter spots where clover or ragweed or shorter grasses had taken root.

We would hear the coyotes howling over the ridge and go to the middle of the
field and call them. When they crested the ridge to investigate we would
crouch down really low on all fours with our eyes down. They would creep up on
us with two or three going off to our flanks. When they got close enough we
would stand up, wave our arms and hoot and holler, scaring them off. It was
probably foolish for many reasons but we were in our late teens or early
twenties and thought that a three on three mano-e-pata match was no contest in
our favor.

We didn't do this often but it happend more than once.

------
GigabyteCoin
So this is why we have been noticing exponentially more "coyotes" roaming
around the suburbs of the GTA recently?

My girlfriend was walking our dog last week and saw 3 of them within an hour.
The next morning she saw 2.

The other day I was walking the dog and some kid stopped me to warn me about a
"wolf" that was growling at him around the corner.

This is all within steps of our small "downtown" and I just kept thinking how
strange it was to see so many of them in such a short period of time. I have
lived here all my life and I don't think that I have ever seen a single
"coyote" in the flesh.

Looks like it's time to start carrying some pepper spray on my usual dog
walks? The thought of watching some wild animal devour my dog (or me) is
terrifying.

~~~
anon4
Pepper spray? Are guns outlawed in Canada? Why not just shoot it on sight?

~~~
GigabyteCoin
Guns are basically outlawed in Canada, yes.

You are allowed to own a handgun, but it has to be locked up 100% of the time
unless you're at a gun range or out hunting with a government license.

You can own "long guns" too but that's a different and much longer story.

Still though, you're definitely not allowed to carry it around with you
walking your dog and shoot any coyotes you see fit. In suburbia at least.

------
joeclark77
Never heard of these being called "coywolf", but it's been known for a while
that eastern coyotes are partly mixed with wolves. Good for them, too. Western
coyotes are kind of wimpy. Now if we could breed the coyote with various
bears, North America might start to rival Africa for impressive and fearsome
predators.

~~~
jrapdx3
"Western coyotes are kind of wimpy."

Not around here. In Portland, Oregon, in the west hills <2 miles from downtown
and the Willamette River, we are witnessing a marked increase in coyote
sightings, and scary interactions with humans.

In the last few weeks we've seen coyotes 2 to 3 times a week during daylight,
curiously almost always around 3 PM. Until recently it was rare to see coyotes
at all. They are fond of rifling through the contents of garbage cans. We now
use extra layers of "security" to prevent coyotes getting into the trash.

They are bold, fearless and evidently numerous. A couple of days ago a coyote
was wandering up our driveway when my wife was nearby pulling weeds. Of
course, she got out of the way. Based on its direction I was concerned it
might go into the garage, dislodging it from there could be a big problem.

Fortunately that day the coyote headed elsewhere. However people have become
alarmed to the extent a neighborhood meeting is scheduled next week to
consider options. There's serious concern about safety of small kids in the
area, and really I can understand that source of worry.

~~~
joeclark77
Is it legal to shoot them there? (The coyotes, not the small kids...)

------
sarciszewski
Somewhere on the Internet, a furry just gained yet another fursona.

> LIKE some people who might rather not admit it, wolves faced with a scarcity
> of potential sexual partners are not beneath lowering their standards.

Oddly appropriate.

EDIT: Nevermind, looks like they have at least 3 years on this joke:
[https://www.furaffinity.net/view/9465519/](https://www.furaffinity.net/view/9465519/)

~~~
duskwuff
Let's just say that Furry Twitter is having _lots_ of fun with this news
story.

~~~
sarciszewski
Heh. My only contacts in Furry Twitter happens to be Infosec Furry Twitter. :P

------
frozenport
_The wolf, dingo, dog, coyote, and golden jackal diverged relatively recently,
around three to four million years ago, and all have 78 chromosomes arranged
in 39 pairs.[6] This allows them to hybridize freely (barring size or
behavioral constraints) and produce fertile offspring._

~~~
PepeGomez
Four million years is recent? We split from chimpanzees three to six million
years ago.

~~~
Squarel
Yes, it is recent.

We are evolutionary newcomers.

~~~
coldcode
I don't think chimps can breed with humans however.

~~~
frozenport
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humanzee](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humanzee)

------
cpfohl
I live (and grew up in) in Central New York (as in: middle of Upstate New
York). We've had "coydogs" as long as I remember. I sort of assumed it was a
myth, in fact I remember being told it was a myth and that they were just
plain coyotes.

Then again, the kids also claimed that they were faster, smarter, and would
hunt humans...so there was definitely some mythology going on.

------
fumar
There is a great PBS Nature episode on the Coywolf. There is footage of these
animals leaving in close proximity to humans near major cities.

Link:[http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/coywolf-meet-the-
coywolf/8605...](http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/coywolf-meet-the-
coywolf/8605/)

------
bordercases
What a beautiful creature!

~~~
Zenst
Indeed, had a look at a few clips and pictures and look and indeed traits
remind me of a Fox more than it's genetic-background heritage.

ADD:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canidae](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canidae)
most interesting compliment to this article

------
ChuckMcM
I find these stories intriguing. Several have come together over the last
decade or so, this one, the bear hunt in Florida because of too many bears,
the Burmese Pythons in the Everglades eating everything, mountain lions living
in many parts of the Bay Area near people, the rat explosion in NYC.

All wildlife finding a niche in the urban and suburban world we've created and
retaking territory originally ceded during an aggressive hunting and trapping
phase of our existence.

Once we become the hunted what then? We have not yet seen these animals
predating on the homeless but I expect it's only a matter of time.

~~~
dalke
The Burmese Pythons in the Everglades don't fit your pattern. The Everglades
is neither urban nor suburban, the pythons live in areas that were never
really settled by people, and of course the pythons are not native so are not
'retaking'.

And it's hard to say anything about NYC's rat problem as there are no good
estimates of the rat population. The generally held belief has been one rat
per person, but a statistician recently argued that there are only two
million. Quoting further from
[http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/06/nyregion/8-million-rats-
in...](http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/06/nyregion/8-million-rats-in-new-york-
data-suggest-that-legend-is-flawed.html?_r=0) :

> The health department says its efforts have paid off. “We have seen an
> overall decrease in the number of active rat signs throughout New York
> City,” Levi Fishman, the deputy press secretary for the department, said in
> an email.

> How much of a decrease? Mr. Fishman said that “there are no scientific
> methods for being able to accurately count the number of rats in New York or
> any large city.” Similarly, Kevin Ortiz, a spokesman for the Metropolitan
> Transportation Authority, which is well steeped in the battle against
> rodents, said it had never quantified the rat population living in the
> subway system.

Instead, I suggest a possible bias to your information sources: everyone has
cameras, and takes pictures of everything, so the number of rat-related videos
has gone up.

You bring up 'the homeless'. As a reminder, many of those people living and
killing animals in the 'aggressive hunting and trapping phase of our
existence' did not do so from homes, so I don't think that's the relevant
characteristic.

~~~
ChuckMcM
Your point about the rats is well taken. It does make for good click bait and
over exposure serves multiple interests beyond simply informing the public.

I worry about the homeless as a vulnerable population who is
disproportionately threatened by wildlife in an urban setting. Whether it is
from plague carrying fleas on rats running around an encampment or a group of
coywolves or a mountain lion deciding that this particular human sleeping
under a bush in a park might be prey.

~~~
dalke
Sure. My comment is different. "Homeless" humans managed pretty well against
lions, tigers, and bears. I think it's the defenseless you're concerned about.
A house is one sort of defense. So is a car. So is a homeless encampment. So
are guns and dogs. Few homeless are defenseless in the way you mean. While
some people with homes are still defenseless against the threats you are
worried about.

If you are concerned about plague, I think you should look more at domestic
cats than homeless humans. Cats kill and eat infected rodents and pass the
disease to humans. There have been 16 in the US because of that transmission
mechanism. For that matter, there have bee 64 cases as a result of someone
butchering or skinning an animal.

And while traditionally linked with poor sanitation leading to rat
infestation, "plague in New Mexico has increasingly occurred in more affluent
areas, a result of continued suburban and exurban development in enzootic
plague foci." It's rich people who are helping to spread the plague these
days, not the poor!

[http://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/21/1/14-0564_article](http://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/21/1/14-0564_article)
goes into more detail, and points to "performing common outdoor peridomestic
work (e.g., cutting brush or chopping wood)" and "a result of contact with
infected fleas that were brought into the home by indoor/outdoor pets" as the
two largest vectors.

This isn't to say you shouldn't worry, only that more information might bring
more focus into what you should worry about, and homelessness leading to
plague should not be one of them.

(P.S. I'm an inveterate researcher. I tracked down these details in part
because I enjoy it. I can totally understand how this style is outside the
usual cocktail style discussion, which is all this topic really deserves, and
don't expect or demand a comparable response.)

~~~
ChuckMcM
(P.S. I think its _awesome_ , I love a person who explores the questions more
deeply.)

I think you make an excellent point vis-a-vis homeless vs defenseless. My
exposure to plague warnings has primarily been in the county and state parks
around the Bay Area. The primary vector being fleas per
[https://www.cdph.ca.gov/programs/vbds/Documents/PreventingVB...](https://www.cdph.ca.gov/programs/vbds/Documents/PreventingVBDinNationalParksinCA.pdf)

We have also got a number of lion sightings/encounters although I could not
find the 2014 or current data
([http://www.dfg.ca.gov/wildlife/lion/trends.html](http://www.dfg.ca.gov/wildlife/lion/trends.html))

And of course the linked article talking about Coywolves and relating to their
lack of fear of humans.

My thesis is that human/wildlife encounters will increase as the populations
of these various species increase in response to greater success in living in
urban and suburban areas. And my conjecture is that as a result of increased
encounters there will be more incidents where the defenseless are harmed. Have
not yet thought of a good way to test that hypothesis yet.

And that has also lead to exposure to racoons and bears both of whom are
willing to cross paths with humans in order to scavenge food or food scraps.

------
transfire
Technically not a new _species_ , rather a new _subspecies_.

~~~
igravious
This puzzled me as well. Do we not have a word for this? Is _subspecies_
really the word? In linguistics mutually intelligible but distinct `languages'
are called dialects. Similarly is there a term for mutually interbreedable but
distinct `species'?

~~~
epochwolf
> Similarly is there a term for mutually interbreedable but distinct
> `species'?

It's species or subspecies. Animal classification has always been a little bit
fuzzy and has some legacy cruft laying around. Like wolves, coyotes, and dogs
are distinct animals with different behaviors but are definitely capable of
interbreeding.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Species](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Species)

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subspecies](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subspecies)

For domestic animals, we have the noun breed, as in breed of dog.

------
deadprogram
Fascinating. I have had a number of urban close encounters with coyotes in the
west US, and the prospect of a similar animal but with less fear of human is
certainly concerning.

------
Houshalter
Hybridization is super interesting from an evolutionary perspective. Two
populations can evolve down very different paths. Evolving all sorts of new
genes and adaptions. Then hybridization mixes it all up. And over time, the
best combination of genes from both species will be selected for. Creating
something more fit than either of the original species.

~~~
stefantalpalaru
Not so fast with the evolutionary fantasies. If they can breed and produce
fertile offspring, are they really different species? Maybe we've got the
definitions wrong somewhere.

~~~
Amezarak
> If they can breed and produce fertile offspring, are they really different
> species?

Species are defined more-or-less arbitrarily. It's essentially impossible to
come up with a meaningful definition of "species" because of the nature of
biology.

Imagine a gigantic tree, beginning with the first organism billions of years
ago, with every living thing that ever existed as a node. Now, for the sake of
the thought experiment, imagine that none of the lines ever died out.

There's no way to really consistently draw a line between one node and another
and say "these are two different species." We pretty arbitrarily decide "well,
these two sets are sufficiently different so let's call them two difference
species." Like sibling commenters noted, sometimes hugely different species
can interbreed and produce fertile offspring. Sometimes extremely similar (and
related!) species can't breed. Or sometimes they can but never will except
under laboratory conditions.

~~~
stefantalpalaru
We make this classification, so we can adjust the rules until our model fits
reality at an acceptable level. So let's define species as groups of
individual of a similar genotype. We were not able to define and measure
genetic distances in the past, but now with the ability to read whole genomes,
we can do just that.

> sometimes hugely different species can interbreed and produce fertile
> offspring

Then they are obviously not hugely different. Were we just comparing
phenotypes when we decided to classify them as different species? Let's
improve on that.

~~~
Amezarak
> So let's define species as groups of individual of a similar genotype. We
> were not able to define and measure genetic distances in the past, but now
> with the ability to read whole genomes, we can do just that.

How similar?

Consider the following: imagine that you assembled a gathering of all your
ancestors in the male line for say, the past two million years. Let's say, for
illustrative purposes, that the gap between each generation is twenty years.
So you'd have 5 people to represent a century - you, your father, your
grandfather, your great-grandfather, and your great-great grandfather. That
makes 50 people per millennium, 500 people per ten thousand years, 5,000
people per hundred thousand years, and 50,000 people per million years. So two
million years of ancestry gets you 100,000 people, the size of a small city,
or about enough people to fit in the Rose Bowl stadium.

So really, not that many people in the grand scheme of things. Now line all
those people up in order going all the way back to the first guy, who we'll
just call Adam. The difference between Adam N and Adam N+1 is very small.
There's no point at which you can say "Adam N is this species and Adam N+1 is
that other species." But there's a hell of difference between you and Adam.

The same logic applies to life in general, the tree is just a lot bigger and
messier and we're talking about distant cousins rather than ancestors, and
some lines are extinct.

But going back to your proposed definition - similar genotype - we can have
all kinds of bizarre situations. Say we require the genotype to be 99%
similar. By this definition, we conclude that Adam M and N are the same
species. We also come to the conclusion that Adam N and Adam O are the same
species. But wait! Adam M and O are only 98% similar! What do we do - assign
multiple species labels to the same individuals?

 _Species_ has proven a necessary and useful abstraction, but it nevertheless
doesn't hold up well under scrutiny. That's fine, as long as we recognize its
limitations.

> Then they are obviously not hugely different. Were we just comparing
> phenotypes when we decided to classify them as different species? Let's
> improve on that.

Genotypes certainly provide useful information, but they can also muddy the
waters.

Assume that we take the definition of "any two organisms that can interbreed
and produce fertile offspring are the same species" as our preferred
definition. (This has its own problems: for example, did you know mules
sometimes _are_ fertile, just not usually? Did you know it's _conceivable_
that humans and chimpanzees can interbreed?) It is _entirely possible_ for A
and B to be distantly related genetically, yet able to interbreed, while A and
C are closely related and unable to interbreed. "Can interbreed" is not
necessarily a proxy for genetic distance.

------
__david__
Coywolf isn't a very good name—I think Wolfote rolls off the tongue much
better.

~~~
plorg
Or perhaps the "dire woof".

------
leroy_masochist
It's becoming more of a problem in northwestern Connecticut for sure.

------
vpribish
aww... I've have reached my article limit.

~~~
kqr2
Just click on hn's _web_ link and then read the article through google.

~~~
aryehof
Thanks for pointing that out. I never knew one could do that.

------
gricardo99
And part human! (Come on it's almost Halloween)

