COBB COUNTY, Ga. — A coyote attacked a woman’s small dog, then took off with it, leaving the dog in a dangerous spot — a busy road.
Channel 2 Cobb County Bureau Chief Michele Newell was live at Animal Services for Channel 2 Action News at 5:00.
Marie Uden says the interaction left her traumatized.
“He loves people. He loves animals. He probably would’ve loved the coyote if it hadn’t taken him away,” she said.
Uden says she knew something was wrong moments after she let her dog Teddy out in the backyard last Friday.
“It happened right there. I heard the leaves, and I heard him screaming. I knew something was attacking him,” Uden said.
She says the coyote took off with Teddy.
“In a flash, he was gone,” Uden said.
Moments later, she heard teddy barking from the other side of her fence along Lower Roswell Road in East Cobb.
“The coyote must have dropped him, and then I was just in panic, screaming ‘Somebody stop stop,’ because I thought he was going to get hit by a car,” Uden said.
Uden said she is thankful for the good Samaritan that stopped in the middle of the road to save Teddy’s life.
“She scooped him up and put him in her truck, and my neighbor went and got him,” she said.
Teddy wasn’t injured, but Cobb County Animal Services says a coyote that attacked a dog in East Cobb weeks ago was.
“A coyote came up snatched up the dog and subsequently dropped him, but it did injure the dog,” said Steve Hammond, Cobb County Animal Services director.
Coyote sightings are common right now because it is mating season.
Land development has played a role, too, because coyotes are being pushed out of their natural habitat.
“We will observe higher conflicts with these wildlife species due to us removing them from their more natural habitat pushing them closer to where we are at,” said Blake Graber, the urban wildlife biologist for the Georgia Department of Natural Resources.
“If you can alter your behavior to safely coexist with them, then there will be less problems for the coyotes and the residents of metro Atlanta,” he said.
You can slam together pots and pans to scare coyotes off. You could also spray them with a water hose.
But keep your distance, and keep your dogs on a leash.
Experts say Georgia’s coyote population rebounds faster than people can get rid of the animals.
The University of Georgia conducted a long-range study of populations across the southeast.
Researchers concluded it may be a lost cause to curb the population.
They determined coyotes repopulate quickly, and there was at least one per every square mile of areas they studied.
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