Writer J. Frank Dobie once recalled an evening performance on his father's Texas ranch in the early 1900s. The vaqueros had butchered a steer that afternoon, and after feasting on the fresh beef, they burst into song. Coyotes soon joined their ballad. "Cantad, amigos!" the vaqueros cheered to their wild accompanists, the men’s voices often indistinguishable from the coyotes' chorus. Dobie wished he could be sung to sleep every night and awoken every day by such canine amigos. But not everyone has regarded coyotes so amiably, viewing them instead as livestock-killing varmints. Who are these desert vocalists? And do they deserve their bad-dog reputation?
Coyote calls in this episode were provided by The Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s Macaulay Library.