MOUNT VERNON — Residents of Murray Road are used to seeing wild animals in their neighborhood but Friday morning they saw something out of the ordinary.
Jay Bittner said his wife, Joanne, noticed something out in the backyard and thought maybe it was a box or a piece of trash. Her husband, Jay, took a look through his binoculars and realized it was a coyote.
“I was looking through my binoculars and thought maybe it was a deer. It was fawn colored with long legs. It wasn’t a dog,” Jay Bittner said. “I saw the muzzle and knew it was a coyote.”
Bittner then ventured outside with his camera to see if he could snap a photograph of the elusive animal.
“It was looking away when I got the picture,” Bittner said. He thought maybe the animal was scratching at something and didn’t realize he was there.
According to Ohio Department of Natural Resources Wildlife Officer Mike Miller, a coyote had been spotted in the area of Murray and Newark roads, very near the Bittner residence, earlier Friday morning. The account told to Miller was that the animal appeared to have the mange, a condition that causes animals to loose hair and suffer from skin irritations.
“It could be the same animal,” Miller said. “If it is sick, it’s going to be uncomfortable and move around more. It will also be more apt to eat garbage or whatever is easily available.”
A well animal, according to Miller, won’t stick around long when it notices people.
“They are elusive,” said Miller. “Once they see you they are gone.”
Bittner said that he called the Knox County Animal Shelter. When an animal control officer arrived, the animal made a quick exit when the officer walked toward it.
Coyotes are pretty common and are found in every township and every county in the state of Ohio, according to Miller. They are very intelligent animals and are very difficult to hunt or trap.
There is a year-round season on coyotes but they are mostly hunted in the fall and winter, Miller said. A traditional hunting license is required, unless the hunter is on own property.
