SAN JUAN CAPISTRANO : Officials Search for Pack of Coyotes

County animal-control officers scoured brush and decaying orange groves along Trabuco Creek on Tuesday, seeking signs of a group of coyotes reported to have attacked a horse carrying a female rider last weekend.

Barbara Martiens, 22, of Mission Viejo was uninjured, but her 8-year-old quarter horse, Dude, suffered “evidence of puncture wounds on a rear-right leg,” said Jerry Harris, a city councilman who is the owner of Sierra Vista Stables, where the horse is kept.

According to a county animal-control report, Martiens, an experienced rider at the stables, was leading Dude along a trail Sunday afternoon about half a mile north of the stables when a group of possibly 10 coyotes surprised them, causing the horse to buck. After pursuing the horse and rider for 200 yards, the coyotes dispersed, according to the report.

Mark McDorman, the county animal-control’s chief of field services, said he and his officers were stumped as to what could have caused such an incident.

“It’s hard to tell what happened by looking at the wounds,” he said. “Right now, we can’t form any conclusions because none of the evidence adds up. This is certainly not typical coyote behavior.”

Coyotes tend to be shy and not aggressive toward larger animals, said Sgt. Larry Cyr, an animal-control officer who was dispatched to the stables Tuesday.

“We have close contacts with coyotes all the time, but I’ve never heard of one attacking a horse,” Cyr said. “Coyotes follow horses all the time, just like they follow joggers, people walking their dogs. We’re not sure why.”

The only thing that could possibly cause something like this is rabies, Cyr said.

“It’s a concern,” Cyr said. “We’re trying to determine if there was skin broken in the animal.

“It’s possible it could be quarantined, which is standard procedure,” he added. “But we just don’t know what exactly happened yet.”

Harris said that the horse had had all its shots and that a quarantine did not appear necessary.

For Harris, the owner of the 14-acre stables for the past 10 years, the only answer might be that the horse and rider spooked the coyotes near their den. But he does not believe that the coyotes really meant to attack the horse.

“This is nothing to be taken lightly. I think we need to get to the bottom of this,” Harris said. “But to think that these animals tried to take a horse down for a meal is really far-fetched.”