Passing along something the trail volunteers at Oso Creek told me las…

Ying Sato

Jul 1, 2026, 11:23 PM

Passing along something the trail volunteers at Oso Creek told me last month, because it reframed how I think about our coyotes here. The reason we see so many in the greenbelt behind Marguerite is partly us: fallen loquats and figs rotting under trees, unsecured trash the night before pickup, and folks leaving cat food on patios. That stuff pulls in rodents and rabbits, and the coyotes just follow the buffet. Fish & Wildlife's line is that a coyote that learns to associate people with food is the one that loses its natural wariness, and that's when problems start. So the single most useful thing we can do to keep them wild and keep their distance is boring: pick up the fruit, lid the cans, feed pets indoors. Coexisting doesn't mean doing nothing, it means not accidentally inviting them to dinner. If you do want to log a sighting so the city has real data, Mission Viejo routes through the Coyote Cacher map rather than a phone tree.