Family shares coyote experience
Wild animal followed family dog home, waited for it to come out again after attack
A few days before Christmas, Buffy, a goofy, lovable pitbull, and Anna, her dachshund/ beagle pal, were let out behind their owner’s home in Cape Forchu, Yarmouth County, to answer nature’s call.
Nature almost didn’t let Buffy return.
She roamed just a little further than Anna and discovered a scruffy dog-like animal that both intrigued and frightened her. She began barking at it.
It’s unknown if there were one or several coyotes that attacked Buffy, but thankfully she was able to escape when she heard her owner calling.
She bolted the short distance back to the house, where she lives with her owners Jenna d’Entremont and Scott Nickerson. What Jenna saw next disturbed her so much, she called Scott.
A coyote had followed Buffy and now stood at the top of the hill, staring back at Jenna, not the least bit intimidated.
Jenna and Scott watched the coyote from a vantage point upstairs.
“It stood there for about 10 minutes, waiting for Buffy,” says Scott. “Then it started pacing back and forth and ran back into the woods.”
The couple were grateful to have the dogs safely in the house.
“She’s a tough little girl but this thing was a lot bigger than her,” says Scott of Buffy.
The couple didn’t realize anything was wrong with Buffy, an 11-year-old rescue, for several hours until they discovered bite marks on her back legs. She had five puncture wounds. The following night, a visiting friend told him they looked like coyote bites.
Jenna and Scott, as well as their neighbours, often hear coyotes yipping and howling nearby, early in the morning.
Scott cleaned Buffy’s wounds with iodine and they healed quickly, with the exception of one that took a bit longer to scab over.
The attack on his dog alarmed him. He called a friend who is a licensed trapper, Mitchell Rodgerson, who earlier had asked for permission to trap coyotes in the area.
Scott also went out and got his firearm licence after the incident.
“I’m the biggest animal lover there is,” he says. “It was hard for me to make that decision.”
But he wants to be prepared and also wants to warn people about the dangers to pets in the Cape Forchu area.
Recently, a woman walking the West Cape with her two dogs encountered three coyotes along the shore.
“It’s good to get the word out. It could have been a very different story with us. That coyote was after Buffy.” natural environment, safe communities and friendly people, which contribute to our quality of life, we will continue to promote and showcase the Municipality as a great place to work, live and thrive. Persistence and patience have paid off.”
The total estimated cost of the project is $5,135,394, with Bell contributing $2,567,696, an investment of $1,427,918 through the Nova Scotia Internet Funding Trust, as part of Develop Nova Scotia’s Internet for Nova Scotia Initiative, and the Municipality of the District of Shelburne providing $1,139,780.
The project will provide residences and businesses with direct connections to Bell’s all fibre network offering access to Internet speeds up to 1.5 Gbps, the fastest home Internet speeds in the country. Work on the project has already begun and is expected to be completed by the end of the year.
“We will be meeting with
Bell shortly to discuss how to move this project forward as expeditiously as possible,” said Warden Smith.
Recently the Canadian Radiotelevision and Telecommunications Commission CRTC launched a $750 million fund titled Closing the Digital Divide in Canada. Develop Nova Scotia is issuing another request for proposals within the next week that will invite projects to expand into some of the harder to reach areas in the region and across the province.
Develop Nova Scotia is the Crown Corporation responsible for developing and implementing a strategy to provide high-speed Internet access to unserved and underserved Nova Scotians. They manage the $193 million placed in an Internet trust fund to connect more communities, homes and businesses across Nova Scotia.