Another interesting reference to the coywolf. There adaptation to urban environments is their behavior is more stealthy, and not pack oriented hunters, and they tend to avoid human contact though small pets are sometimes a part of their diet. They actually for the most part their presence goes unnoticed by urbanites, which gives them a survival advantage over wolves. Their appearance is more a medium sized shaggy mixed breed dog.
The North Carolina Red Wolf is likely a variation of the coywolf.
Coywolves are Taking Over Eastern North America | Smart News | Smithsonian Magazine
Coywolves are Taking Over Eastern North America
Coywolves are not ‘shy wolves’—they are coyote-wolf hybrids (with some dog mixed in) and now number in the millions
(
www.ForestWander.com via Wikimedia Commons (CC-BY-3.0))
By
Marissa Fessenden
SMITHSONIANMAG.COM
NOVEMBER 3, 2015
even cities. What they may not know is that
eastern coyotes aren’t true coyotes at all. They might better be known as hybrids, or coywolves.
Coywolves only emerged over the last century or so and have since spread successfully over much of eastern North America,
reports Zachary Davies Boren for The Independent.
As deforestation, hunting and poisoning depleted the population numbers of eastern wolves, they interbred with western coyotes.
A report from PBS writes that the first eastern coyote or coywolf appeared around 1919 in Ontario, Canada. Today, wolf DNA has popped up in "coyote" poop
as far south as Virginia.
The hybrid, or
Canis latrans var., is about 55 pounds heavier than pure coyotes, with longer legs, a larger jaw, smaller ears and a bushier tail. It is part eastern wolf, part wester wolf, western coyote and with some dog (large breeds like Doberman Pinschers and German Shepherds),
reports The Economist. Coywolves today are
on average a quarter wolf and a tenth dog.
That blend helps make the hybrid so successful that it now numbers in the millions, Roland Kays of North Carolina State University tells