We've nicknamed it: Wile E.

Most of our neighbors have a seen a small, red fox in our neighborhood over the past few years - I have yet to see it. Last summer, I did see and hear what I thought was a wolf or coyote, running up and down the street in the middle of the night making a distinctive "yip-yip" sound.

My wife figured that I was hallucinating - she pays little mind to what I say usually. I looked into it the next day, and a bit of research showed it to be a coyote, for sure. It looked pretty much like the one in this picture. Over the winter, I did not see or hear any more evidence of the critter.


The cool spring weather has us sleeping with the windows open. Last week, we heard the "yip-yip" again in the middle of the night, but didn't see anything. Earlier this week, early in the morning, the wife is looking out the kitchen window and sees a dog in the yard. The dog looks like a husky my neighbor used to have, but then she notices it looks too skinny and scruffy - and it has a small animal in it's mouth! A quick trip to the computer confirms my earlier coyote sighting. He's back, and he's hungry. We've spoken to a few of the neighbors, and while none has seen the coyote, several have seen the fox.

My research led me to this page on Rutgers Rarities. It seems that a pack of coyote are roaming around the woods in Piscataway, NJ, near the Rutgers campus. Be careful out there!