Coyote Populace Puts Pet Owners on the Defensive : Wildlife: Residents of Orange hills feel under siege. County and state officials say it’s a problem with humans, who must learn to coexist with the wily creatures.

Humorist Mark Twain once referred to them as “the most friendless of God’s creatures.”

But as far as Lori Klunder and her neighbors in the hills of east Orange are concerned, the predators which have devoured scores of household pets over the last six months have friends in very high places.

When Klunder recently asked for help in ridding her neighborhood of coyotes, county animal control officials sent a pamphlet instead, telling her how to co-exist with the beast.

“It’s not a coyote problem,” said Marie Hulett-Curtner, a public education officer with Orange County Animal Control. “It’s a lack-of-human-awareness problem.”

Klunder got virtually the same response from the state Department of Fish and Game, which refuses to trap the animals, which kill about a dozen pets every night in Orange County.

“I lost a cat to an automobile once,” said Bob Schlichting, a Fish and Game spokesman. “But I don’t think there should be a ban on automobiles.”

Though wildlife officials don’t know exactly how many coyotes live here, they say there is a “substantial” population that has adapted well to the urban environment. Their numbers have become increasingly visible lately, animal control officers say, because last year’s fires cleared thousands of acres of underbrush, forcing the animals to seek new hunting grounds.

The coyote, a relative of the fox and wolf, is the size of a medium-sized shepherd dog and weighs about 25 pounds. Largely nocturnal, it rarely hunts in groups.

Coyotes have long preyed upon pets in Orange County, though they seem especially active near foothills and adjacent to open spaces, wildlife experts say. In the past two years, Tustin, Villa Park and San Clemente have all been hot spots for coyote problems.

Klunder’s community is now the latest victim. In the past four months, coyotes killed two of her cats, Bugsy and Bianca, and the telephone poles around the neighborhood are cluttered with signs from people desperately seeking information about their missing pets.

“I was so heartbroken,” Klunder said. “I don’t want someone else to go through what I went through. And the problem is, it’s getting worse.”

After Bugsy and Bianca were killed, neighbor Denise Harrison stopped letting D.D., her shaggy little Maltese, run around her fenced back yard. Harrison said she would feel safer if county animal control would “remove the coyotes to a place where they could live like they are supposed to live.”

Harrison, whose townhouse complex abuts the foothills, said, “I’ve been hearing more and more coyotes lately. It’s really terrifying and it’s so close.”

The best government agencies can offer, however, is simple and direct advice--keep your pets indoors at all times. Other measures such as capture and relocation are usually prohibited by state law to protect the ecosystem.

Animal control officials say cats are especially vulnerable to coyotes because cats often regard the predator as a dog and try to repel the attack by merely swatting the coyote across the face.

“If a cat tries that with a coyote,” said Hulett-Curtner, “the coyote doesn’t care and in the next instance it has the cat by the neck and that’s the end of the story.”

As coyotes become bolder about intruding into neighborhoods and back yards, Klunder fears a coyote might harm a human, particularly a small child playing alone outside.

Though officials warn parents not to leave children unattended in areas where coyotes have been spotted, less than a handful of people are injured every year by coyote attacks. Dogs are considered a much greater threat to people.

To get rid of coyotes, their food supply must be cut off. Officials say that pets should be kept and fed indoors. Trash cans must be securely locked so coyotes cannot get into them.

“Coyotes will leave an area if there is no food,” said Hulett-Curtner. “It’s common sense.”

While Klunder and her neighbors say they will follow all the precautions, Klunder wants her her community to hire a professional trapper. But wildlife officials advise against it.

Coyotes are very difficult to catch, and those that are trapped are usually old, young or stupid, leaving behind the strongest and craftiest animals. Said Hulett-Curtner: “You actually alter the gene pool to help create a super-coyote.”