A coyote recently made its way to Alcatraz Island for the first time in documented history, most likely from SF’s Coit Tower area, after it perhaps got caught up in the Bay’s current, which was much stronger than usual due to recent storms.
Yes, the coyotes around here are pretty good swimmers.
As SFGate reports, Aidan Moore, who works for Alcatraz City Cruises, shared some videos on Facebook featuring a lone coyote furiously doggy-paddling its way to Alcatraz as nearby tourists watched in amazement. While coyotes are common on nearby Angel Island, where around 14 to 17 coyotes live by way of Tiburon, as SFist reported last fall, this is the first documented sighting of them on Alcatraz Island.
“I didn’t believe them to start with,” Moore told SFGate, until he saw the video footage, which was filmed by a guest. Per SFGate, the coyote came ashore along the southern edge of the island near the Agave Trail, reportedly “panting and shivering.”
The coyote appeared a lot like its cartoon counterpart, as it struggled to gain its bearings while navigating the rocky terrain, as can be seen in the videos and accompanying screenshots.
Then the coyote quickly disappeared after it hit land.
A spokesperson for the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, Julian Espinoza, confirmed the sighting. “Coyotes can be commonly seen throughout our San Francisco and Marin parklands but never before on Alcatraz,” he told SFGate. “This was the first time our park biologists observed anything like this.”
SFGate spoke to a captain with Alcatraz City Cruises, who said the run-off from recent storms was entering the bay at eight or nine knots that day, or around eight miles an hour, making it impossible for the animal to outswim it.
“I suspect he fell into the water chasing something and was swept away,” Moore told SFGate.
Christine Wilkinson, a conservation scientist and carnivore ecologist who has researched coyotes for University of California Berkeley and the California Academy of Sciences, told SFGate the coyote, which she said appeared very weak, may have ventured from SF’s Coit Tower area in search of more green space to claim new territory — choosing the risky bay currents over the deadly Interstate 280 in the other direction.
Wilkinson told SFGate she wondered if the coyote will try to claim the territory and call over a mate, like the coyotes on Angel Island did. “But it is a much smaller island and I am not sure if I’ve heard of a coyote pack ever establishing such a tiny territory,” she said.
It’s unknown if the coyote is still on the island or whether it made its way back to where it came from. “We’ve been wandering around the island looking for him, but no one has been able to spot him,” Moore told SFGate. “It’s possible he might not be seen for a while.”
Images: Screenshot from videos
Previously: Coyotes Are Now Swimming More Than a Mile Back and Forth From Tiburon to Angel Island
