Posted on 10/28/2009 12:33:10 PM PDT by Borges
Taylor Mitchell, a 19-year-old Toronto singer whose debut album was released in March, has died in a Nova Scotia hospital after being mauled by coyotes in a Cape Breton park.
Mitchell was hiking Tuesday on the Skyline Trail in Cape Breton Highlands National Park when she was attacked by two coyotes. Another hiker, who was walking nearby, heard her cries for help and called 911.
Officers arrived about 3:15 p.m., and one of the coyotes fled into the bush. The other coyote was shot and limped away.
Mitchell was airlifted to a hospital in Halifax, where she died early Wednesday.
"I spoke to her mother late last night and at one point we thought, she was stable," said manager Lisa Weitz, "but she had lost too much blood."
The singer and songwriter, who loved the outdoors, had started her East Coast tour on Oct. 23 in New Brunswick and was scheduled to perform in Sydney tonight. "She had a small break and (she) wanted to go hiking," said Weitz.
Mitchell, whose MySpace photograph has her standing in the woods with a guitar in one hand, released her debut album this March.
A website review describes her album as "a collection of mostly original songs that showcases a range of styles, from folk to country-rock to pop."
Born and raised in Toronto, Mitchell studied music from an early age and graduated in 2008 from Etobicoke School of the Arts.
She was very excited to be touring the Maritimes, said Weitz. "She was just exhilarated to be on the road and performing."
Friends and family are in shock, said Weitz.
In Nova Scotia, Don Anderson, a biologist with that province's Natural Resources Department, said coyote attacks in the area are uncommon, but they do happen from time to time.
An Ontario girl was bitten on the same trail several years ago, Anderson said.
Ethel Merry, owner of the nearby Cheticamp Motel, said the incident was unfortunate but she wasn't surprised to hear about it. She said the motel is about 10 kilometres from the entrance of the park but she often sees coyotes.
"My home is a 100 feet from (the motel) but if it's dark outside, I don't walk alone," she said. "I've seen too many coyotes."
Merry said the attack hasn't fazed locals or park visitors. "Skyline Trail is one of the most beautiful and famous trails in the park. This isn't stopping any hikers," she said.
The park is on the northern tip of Cape Breton Island.
I have a good size coyote that roams around here at night. He must be eating well because he’s getting bigger. My dog chased him into the woods last week and I had to go in after him.
I noticed the skunk that was living under my shed had gone missing. My neighbor found it’s remains in his back yard. When I’m outside at night now I carry a baseball bat.
Watch out prowling around my woods at night, if the owner doesn’t get you, the wild animals will!
Rabid animals, of whatever stripe, are exceedingly dangerous and not to be trifled with. Sounds like you were lucky there.
When I was a kid I knew guys that would hunt coons for bounty. I suppose some people do the trapping for whatever reason, but I never saw the allure of it.
But I digress....
Glad it turned out for you. Did you stop trapping after that?
CA....
Coyotes , wolves, dogs will interbreed. One of my employees had a big lab mix (Samantha) that played in his front yard at night routinely with coyote packs/gangs whatever. He used to watch them from his front window. She was much larger than they were, when she came into heat they impregnated her. They could have killed her with their collective physical power but for some reason didn’t.
Pups from such a mix are as wild as a wolf and cannot be tamed as far as my experience shows.
Nature works in strange and mysterious ways!
Your comment reminds me of a story. A guy I know shot a coyote while he was in college. He and his roommates lived in a house off campus. They had the coyote hanging from a tree, skinning it for the fur when a woman walked along.
Being college boys they started to tease her and ask if they had her dog. Unfortunately, she had lost a German Shepherd a day or so before and called the cops on them. They had to do a lot of explaining to get out of it.
The same guys used to keep a .22 semi-auto pistol on the kitchen table, since they lived in a really crappy house. There was a rat hole in the baseboard behind the heating stove, just like you see in the cartoons, with two .22 caliber holes just above it. The gun was on the table in case they saw the rat (saw this with my own eyes). Needless to say they didn't care much about how they treated the house.
The bigger the prey, the bigger the predator.
You see the same distinction within Yellowstone, the packs hunting buffalo are both larger in number and in size than the ones hunting elk.
They are vicious and taking over our area because all of their natural predators are gone. They are really difficult to hunt also. I am not sure what can be done about them.
Most animals view other creatures as either a threat, a food source, or a potential pack mate or sexual partner.
http://englishrussia.com/?p=2618
(second video down)
Yes, the Western coyotes are small (I saw one a few weeks ago in the Sierra Nevadas and he was about the size of a small dog.
Coywolves:
http://www.wildlife.state.nh.us/Wildlife/Wildlife_profiles/profile_eastern_coyote.htm
Perhaps she was menstruating and Coyote’s smelled blood, causing the attack instinct.
So sad. Her music on her facebook page is great. What a loss.
Because of “internet medicine” and extreme centralization of the socialized system, Canada’s Maritime provinces have only one central city with serious hospitals capable of administering more than just aspirin... and that is Halifax. If you are outside the perimeter, and face an emergency, you will be flown to Halifax. This can add hours to a life threatening situation. FYI, my 90 yo aunt was allowed to die in N.B. because the airlift was deemed too expensive. This is advanced socialized medicine at work. If I were this singer’s family, I would sue and sue big time.
Sad. RIP.
Even a walking stick would help! Mine has a pointed end.
It looks really beautiful on google earth.
btt
I live in Cape Breton. Don’t have time to read the entire thread now but will do so later.
Coyotes are very large here and there ARE wolves. We have heard a wolf howling at night - no confusing it with coyotes. We’ve often said we think they’ve cross-bred.
The coyotes also bold here. A guy who was walking his medium sized dog on a leash along a country road just outside of our village in broad daylight. Coyote charged out of the woods and grabbed the pet by the neck and was gone before the man could even react, leash and all.
Saw a pack feasting on a deer they had run out onto the lake ice last winter in sight of our picture window that looks out over the Bras d’Or Lake. There were as many as five there at one time. Broad daylight. They also go after farm animals here, especially sheep and fowl.
DNR does not have a bounty on them but you can kill them - even hunt them if you want - unofficially. They are getting too numerous lately probably because of the mild winter temperatures which have allowed an increase in the number of deer, rabbit, grouse and other prey.
Originally they were brought in deliberately by DNR because the deer were too numerous and were eating trees planted for reforestation after logging. I am sure it was done to please STORA which was bought out by NEW PAGE recently - pulp mill here. They own lots of woodlands and have a lease on mucho provincial land for logging, including the Highlands I am told.
There are predators here for the coyote - black bears and cougars. Had a cougar in our yard and woods one night in September - a female yowling for a mate. Hope she got herself a few coyotes for breakfast but one cougar won’t help keep the coyote numbers down much as their territories can be up to 200 square miles.
Don’t ask if we go for a walk with our dogs on a trail or in the woods unarmed and I won’t have to answer you. I’ll just say that what happened to this young woman would not happen to us.
I hope the DNR gives serious consideration to allowing coyotes to be hunted officially and/or they put a bounty on them due to this girl’s death. Gives them a good reason to go against the greenies (Elizabeth F’ing May), but they probably won’t.
Pretty girl. We cannot underestimate the contributing role here of third rate Canadian medical services in her death.
There is absolutely no excuse why she was allowed to bleed to death one day after admission to a socialized medicine pathetic excuse for a hospital. Total bad medical care.
I live in the high-desert area of Central Oregon and I can assure you that they do “pack-up” and the one’s around here are about the size of a medium-sized German Shepherd.
I hear ‘em most every night and catch glimpses of them a couple of times a year during the day. The problem here w/solitary hikers/bikers/climbers is Mountain Lions, not coyotes.
Wolves are even more dangerous. Its nuts to walk in the woods alone without a gun. The fact that a 911 cellphone call even worked means it wasn’t in the deep remote.
That’s funny!!!!
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