I love a good unexpected encounter.
There’s always something out there that you haven’t seen or never expected to see. It’s what keeps us all going back out to the woods, and visitng these incredible national parks.
Coyotes and wolves don’t typically like each other that much. They are fairly similar animals. I mean, there both essentially wild dogs that are fairly social with members of their own species, and they hunt very similar things.
The major difference is size along with wolves being a bit smarter. Wolves have more of a pack mentality and way crazier dynamics within their packs. Coyotes will hunt in groups but usually smaller and often will stray off on their own.
Wolves can weigh over 100-pounds while coyotes top out at 45-pounds. That’s a massive difference, even a small wolf has the size advantage on a coyote.
Often times, areas with high wolf populations have less coyotes around due to their ability to overcome the smaller animal.
This video here will show you one of those ways they outcompete coyotes.
A wolf approaches a coyote den as the coyote pack starts to lose it.
The wolf is fairly unconcerned with them as he checks out the scene. The large animal towers over every coyote that is surrounding him.
The coyotes have enough of the snooping around and start to get more aggressive. One coyote even sneaks up and nips at the wolf, who doesn’t appreciate the bite.
Ultimately the wolf decided the fight wasn’t worth it, given he was highly out numbered, and moves on, but if it really wanted to try and tangle with the group of coyotes, it could’ve held its own.
What a wild interaction to see out there.
