Send in the federal sharpshooters

A few years back, I was taking a walk with my friend Peter near his home in Swampscott, a town on Boston's North Shore.  We were about to head onto the beach when a coyote ambled across our path. Although we didn't have a dog with us, we decided to cede the beach stroll to the ambling coyote.

Peculiarly, although I tend to associate coyotes with the west - drifting along with the tumbling tumbleweed, etc. -coyotes have been in Massachusetts since the 1950s. Now, they're pretty widespread throughout the state. Including in Boston and its environs.

I don't recall ever seeing coyotes in Boston - our gift from Mother Nature tends to the be wild turkey - but they're here.

And they're on the Cape, too.

My sister Kath used to have a home in Wellfleet, located on a nature preserve, and at night we could hear the coyotes howling. Aroooooooo!

It's generally not Coyotes 'R Us around here, but periodically, there are news reports about a cat or small dog being spirited away by coyotes.

But in the North Shore town of Nahant - a small, densely populated little burg just a hop, skip, and a causeway from Peter's home in Swampscott - things have gotten coyote ugly. 

No humans have been harmed by Nahant’s coyotes, estimated to number about a dozen. But after the disappearances of more than two dozen pets in roughly two years — and reports of three brazen, fatal attacks this year on leashed dogs accompanied by their owners — the town is ever more on edge. Its isolated geography — Nahant is essentially an island connected to the mainland by a narrow, 1.5-mile causeway — contributes to the sense of menace felt by some residents. (Source: Boston Globe)

Just because it's nothing as dramatic as "the dingo stole my baby," Nahant has not been having a happy time of it. 

So the town's Board of Selectmen voted last month to enlist the help of federal sharpshooters who are part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. 

Federal sharpshooters who aren't in the military or Secret Service? Who knew?

The plan has relieved many anxious residents, some of whom now carry whistles and baseball bats on strolls around town, and dress their dogs in $100 “coyote jackets” covered with metal spikes to repel attacks.

There are a few different coyote jackets out there, and most of them come in pink and blue. At $100+, they're not cheap. But, of course, it beats seeing your pupper dragged into oblivion and beyond by a coyote.

“I love animals, and I don’t want to see them killed, but some child on a porch is going to get taken,” said Lisa Wrenn, who watched a coyote snatch her 12-pound Chihuahua, Penelope, off a leash last summer as she stood on her front stairs. Left holding the leash and empty collar, she never saw the dog again, she said.

I'm sure Lisa Wrenn wishes that she'd gotten some coyote protection for Penelope.  Sure, I'd rather see a chihuahua carried off than someone's baby. Still, I can't imagine the horror Lisa experienced. Or poor little Penelope, for that matter.

Not sure when the federal sharpshooters are due in town.

But I've got some advice for those critters. (The Nahant coyotes, not the federal sharpshooters.)

Go West, young coyote. And don't stop at Worcester. Git along, little coyotes, and don't look back until you get to the New York border. Even then, keep a-movin'. You know that Wyoming will be your new home.