Police keep coyote away from students during recess

HEATH — A coyote roaming around a neighborhood and an elementary school continues to elude traps and hunters, but police hope to remove the animal this weekend.

Students at Stevenson Elementary School were allowed out for recess Friday, but only with Heath Police Lt. John Mason patrolling nearby in an all-terrain vehicle.

Mason spotted the coyote and followed him into the adjacent woods but did not want to fire his weapon.

“Definitely, I did not want to shoot while children were there or have them see the coyote put down,” Mason said. “My goal was to make sure he didn’t interfere with recess time.”

Trappers will go out today to re-set some traps, and two police officers volunteered to go out to hunt the coyote Sunday, Mason said.

Heath Schools Superintendent Trevor Thomas said students only will go out for recess next week when a police officer is present, although experts tell him a coyote will not attack people.

“When they see a human, they take off,” Thomas said. “When (the Ohio Department of Natural Resources) says they’re harmless, that’s probably what they mean.

Coyote Update

Sunday Morning a neighbor was walking her dog at our apartment complex here and saw a coyote, so they are still in the area. So they are still in and around Newark, Ohio. That is the only sighting that I am aware of.

Newark Councilman has the solution ............

A recent incident at an Arizona race track, triggered a unique idea in the fertile mind of a Newark, Ohio City Councilman. North Newark has been plagued recently by Coyotes killing animals, and it has become quite a problem.

The Councilman read this article:

Brad Coleman, a driver for Joe Gibbs racing was traveling at 190 mph when he saw a coyote a mere 100 feet away. With no possible way of slowing down to save the creature, the driver ran it over. To his surprise he couldn't figure our where it went. He describes the incident,

“It just started smoking like crazy. And it smelled terrible. I didn’t see anything in the mirror, so I was like, ‘I wonder where it went?’".

The perceptive Councilman contacted a number of area businessmen and plans are underway to start construction of a new racetrack in the general area of the Coyote problem.

The area is located near a soccer field, some farmland, and an ice skating rink. The Councilman was quoted as saying, "We can use that ice facility to store the dead animals until proper disposal procedures can be arranged."

The area is also experiencing an over population of deer, and it is hoped that the noise and traffic will also interest the deer to wonder on to the track.

The Gibbs Race Team is in the process of designing a new front end for their race cars, similar to the ones used by locomotives many years ago. With no additional front end protection, many of the cars running in Arizona have been demolished.

Gibbs stated, "Hitting a coyote at 190 miles per hour is bad enough, but if they think we can help diminish their deer population by hitting a 200 pound deer at that speed they are mistaken."

The finished plans are being drawn up, and will be made public soon.

Coyotes in Newark, Ohio

I have lived in remote areas in California, Nevada and Oregon. Spent a lot of time in Northern Michigan, never had any problem.

I now live in a densely populated area in Newark, Ohio. We have a small dog, Caleb. We live in the Coventry Apartments, I know the man quite well who lost his dog, just got done talking with him outside, as a matter of fact. In Today's News .........

NEWARK, Ohio—Residents in Newark are being advised by police to keep small pets indoors when possible and in sight and under control when they are out of doors.

The alert was issued in the wake of a fatal attack by a coyote Thursday night on a small dog.

The attack occurred Thursday night between 8 and 8:30 p.m. near the Coventry Apartments on Newark’s North Side.

The pet’s owner saw a coyote and saw the wild animal seize the dog, but the dog was not on a leash, and the owner could not rescue the pet Pekingese. The remains were not recovered.

Police say there have been several sightings of coyotes, either alone or in a group, but no other reports of any other attacks on animals.

The Ohio Department of Natural Resources is working with police to try to capture the coyotes.

If anyone sees the coyotes, they should contact Newark Police immediately at 740-670-7201.

Police advise against approaching any coyote and suggest that children should be removed from the area where a coyote is spotted.

With all the things we to worry about in this day and age, now coyotes.

I was just talking with some neighbors outside ........... now we know what has happened to a few cats that are missing, some rabbits that used to bother Caleb on his walks, gone ... one neighbor saw four coyotes in her front yard one morning, I think that explains some of Caleb's unexplained barking in the middle of the night.

Oddly enough, we don't walk Caleb at night anymore, just during the day.

A Coyote problem in Newark, Ohio ...... what's next?