Jan 21, 2010 - 04:30 AM

Just like on TV! One of the great dramas of nature unfolded near the mouth of Oshawa Creek recently, according to one excited reader.

Greg Robinson phoned to tell me a buddy of his had been out walking his dog when he saw three coyotes chase a deer onto the ice.

It seems the canines' paws had better traction than their quarry's hooves and they soon took it down. Game over for the deer; dinner time for the clever, cooperative coyotes.

They usually hunt small prey -- mice, voles, squirrels, rabbits -- on their own, not in a pack. But sometimes in winter, when snow conditions are right, they band together to catch a deer. And with Durham's streams and marshes frozen over, the strategy obviously worked last week.

Coyotes regularly run at speeds of 40 km/h, but can reach 64 km/h when sprinting after prey or escaping danger. Deer can run up to 50 km/h, depending on the terrain, their health, their stamina.

Greg graciously offered to show me the carcass, still visible on the ice the next day. I was working to deadline and had to decline and didn't really want to go see a dead deer, anyway. But I appreciated his dramatic account.

I've had sightings of my own this winter both of deer and coyotes, though not together. I spotted a very healthy-looking coyote trotting down a gully in Thickson's Woods one day. It darted at a squirrel, then carried on. My husband and I glimpsed another handsome animal near a lakeshore marsh in Clarington while doing the annual waterfowl survey last weekend.

Apart from their age-old enemy, man, and their bigger, heavier cousins, timber wolves, coyotes are most vulnerable to diseases. Local populations have obviously recovered from the outbreak of mange that decimated Durham coyote and fox populations about a decade ago. I'll never forget the way cottontail numbers exploded, to the point they ate every shrub in my yard,= and girdled all the hawthorne and nannyberry trees in a nearby nature reserve. Coyotes also perform a great service by keeping mice and vole numbers in balance.

Sheep farmers don't like them. Dennis Yellowlees, near Blackstock, lost more than a dozen of his docile, defenseless flock last summer, only partially compensated for his losses by the Ontario government. He told me how the coyote would sit across the pasture inside the fence, watching the sheep in broad daylight.

House cats of one of my neighbours disappeared last summer, likely caught by a wily coyote, which will eat just about anything it comes across, including grasshoppers, blueberries, windfall apples and carrion. Another good reason to keep your cat safe inside, where it can't wreak its own havoc, preying on birds.

Nature queries: 905-725-2116 or mcarney@interlinks.net