Utah has spent more than $4 million paying people to hunt coyotes to lower their numbers statewide.
But scientific research says that plan could backfire.
Essentially, Utah’s coyotes may respond to hunting by just producing more coyotes.
“I call this coyote math,” North Carolina State University professor Roland Kays said. “It's like two minus one equals five. Because you had two coyotes, you removed one, and now all these other coyotes are going to come in to try to take that spot.”
Kays collaborated with the University of Utah on a 2024 study that tracked coyotes nationwide using wildlife cameras. The results allowed researchers to map them in a standardized way that hadn’t been done before. They found the native predators were even more abundant in areas where they were hunted.
“They're just super adaptable,” Kays said. “We've tried to get rid of them. For a long time, we've had bounties and government agents out after them, trying to kill them. It never works.”
One reason for coyotes’ success is that they are smart, Kays said. As mid-sized predators, they’re both hunters and hunted, so they’ve developed a keen sense of danger and risk evaluation.
On top of that, they can regulate their populations both socially and biologically.
Around 40% of coyotes are not territorial, Kays said. These floaters are always roaming around looking for a new home. So, if hunting removes individuals with an established territory, others will be ready and waiting to fill the vacuum.
Some evidence even suggests that coyotes can respond to hunting pressure by breeding faster, at younger ages and having larger litters to fill in the gaps.
“We're never going to get rid of them, so from a population point of view [hunting] is fine,” Kays said. “But it could have an effect on their behavior,” potentially leading to more conflicts with humans or domestic animals.
A better way to keep numbers in check, he said, would be to have more large predators, such as wolves and cougars. The Division of Wildlife Resources has confirmed just 20 wolves living in Utah since the species was reintroduced to the Northern Rockies in the mid-90s. Estimates from 2022 put the state’s cougar population at around 1,600. Since then, the state approved year-round cougar hunting.
Utah’s coyote hunting bounty program launched in 2012 with funding from state lawmakers. The goal was to boost mule deer populations because coyotes can prey on the fawns, said Darren DeBloois, a game mammals coordinator with the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources.
“The intent of the incentive program was to get the public involved and just to have a force multiplier in terms of trying to get people out there and helping with overall reductions,” he said.
The state paid hunters $152,250 for killing 3,045 coyotes during the 2024 fiscal year ending in June, according to its annual report. That’s the lowest annual total since the program’s inception. Since 2012, the program has paid a grand sum of $4,095,650 for 81,913 coyotes.
The state has typically paid $50 per coyote. In April, however, Utah upped the ante. It now offers hunters $100 per animal when they’re killed in designated mule deer habitat zones that cover much of the state. Hunters submit their kills using the state’s app, which pinpoints their location with GPS.
Utah may be the only state with such an intensive, large-scale bounty program at the moment, but it’s far from the first American attempt to curb the species’ population. Over decades of widespread shooting, trapping, poisoning and hunting competitions dating back to the pioneer days, nothing seems to have had a lasting effect.
Since the 1950s, coyotes have stretched their territory across North America by 40%. Their adaptability has allowed them to spread from New York’s Central Park to the Panamanian rainforest.
DeBloois acknowledged that some research indicates coyote hunting can be counterproductive, but he said that may be because many recent programs haven’t been intensive and sustained enough to make a difference.
“If you just take a few out and then walk away, you'll have other animals move in and in fairly short order,” DeBloois said. “You have to focus your efforts and make sure you keep it up over several years.”
He believes the state’s approach could eventually work because of its widespread and long-lasting efforts.
Thus far, though, the results are unclear.
It’s difficult to get a handle on statewide coyote numbers, DeBloois said, but counting mule deer may be another way to measure impact. He points to a 2023 study conducted in Sevier County that indicated multiple consecutive years of removing coyotes from areas where deer give birth could help more fawns survive.
Statewide, however, deer numbers in 2024 were roughly the same as they were before the bounty program began. DeBloois said that this may be due to other factors that can hurt deer populations, such as drought and bad weather.
Conservation groups have long pushed back against coyote hunting, saying it’s not only ineffective but is also a cruel way to approach native mammals. DeBloois, however, said the same attributes that make their numbers hard to rein in also offer the animals the resilience to bounce back in the long run.
“Coyotes are able to reproduce fairly quickly and in a sustained way. And so we're really trying to hold the tide back a little bit with these programs,” he said.
“The objective isn't to eliminate. And frankly, I think if that was our goal, we would fail.”
