The eastern coyote is an hybrid
COYOTE WOLF OR HYBRID ?
As the biologists suspected it for a long time, the Eastern coyote of Massachusetts is an hybrid of the wolf and coyote. The genetic study of fabrics coming from 75 coyotes captured in the Commonwealth (Kentucky, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania and Virginia) showed that all contained to differing degree of genes of a subspecies of the wolf of the Eastern wolf (Canis lupus lycaon) living in the south-east of Canada and genes of the Western coyote (Canis latrans), an animal appreciably smaller than the Eastern coyote.
The study was led by Bradley White, a geneticist of the University of the Trent, in Ontario according to fabric samples collected by the biologist Jonathan G. Way. According to Bradley White, "the coyotes of the East appear genetically distinct. They are not coyotes of the West or wolves of the East. They are hybrids of both and they should probably be classified like new species".
Jonathan G. Way collected samples during more than 2 years whereas he studied the coyotes with the College of Boston. Most animals were trapped in the eastern Massachusetts. The results seem to show that, on average, approximately 10 to 15% of the genetic material of the Eastern coyotes and the Eastern wolf. However, certain studied individuals were almost pure Eastern wolwes.
The conclusions of the study consolidate the genetic studies undertaken on the Eastern coyotes in the states of New York and of Maine. Those showed also a mixture of genes of wolves and coyotes in the same proportions at the Eastern coyotes.
HISTORY
The coyotes appeared east of the Mississippi only after 1900. It is thought that the coyotes of the West migrated to Canada, crossing the Big lakes and appeared in the state of New York in the years 1930 then in Massachusetts in the years 1950. However, the coyotes which arrived in the North-East of the United States were larger than their cousins of the west. The male Western coyotes weigh on average 12.8 kg whereas the male Eastern coyotes weigh on average 17.6 kg).
Many biologists then thought that the Western coyotes had reproduced with the Canadian wolwes, thus producing a large hybrid which migrated then towards the North-East of the United States. Two subspecies of wolf, inter alia, live in Canada : Canis lupus occidentalis (distributed in all Canada) and Canis lupus lycaon, a subspecies smaller than one finds mainly in and around the Algonquin park, in the south of Ontario.
They are the genes of the latter which one finds at Eastern coyotes. These species are canids but usually do not reproduce between them. However, this character can occur when the populations of animals are of weak density, in particular when a young male wolf disperses and is found in a sector empty of wolves but inhabited by many coyotes. Certain biologists wish that the Eastern coyote be declared like a species distinct from the Western coyote.
EXTERNAL LINKS
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