A bold coyote got its head stuck inside a large plastic container at the Town of Banff’s recycling depot, prompting authorities to urge residents to thoroughly rinse out recycling products.
A Parks Canada resource conservation specialist managed to free the coyote after quickly responding to a call. The animal’s head got stuck while it was lapping up salad dressing.
“This coyote had a plastic jar completely over its head and it couldn’t get out,” said Michelle Macullo, a spokesperson for Banff National Park. “It was having trouble seeing and it was quite an impediment.”
The resource conservation officer used a pair of snips – a cross between scissors and a knife – to cut back the commercial-size plastic salad dressing container while trying to avoid the animal’s flailing paws.
“He was able to peel it back and the coyote was freed,” said Macullo. “It jumped up into a defensive position – which is fair enough – and then it took off and hid under recycling.”
The close call for the medium-sized coyote serves as an important reminder for residents and businesses to properly rinse out recycling.
“Obviously this little coyote was successful once and he’s going to keep trying even though he had a traumatic experience,” said Diana Waltmann, the Town of Banff’s communications officer.
“It’s important for people to remember to rinse out recycling so there’s no food waste left, and that all recycling be put in appropriate bins.”
Since the Oct. 15 incident, the young coyote has been seen several times in the area, though it has not gotten inside the depot’s fence again to the best of anyone’s knowledge.
Officials say coyotes can be easily habituated.
“Our big concern with this is food conditioning, so while it’s great people are recycling and that’s what we want, we need to ensure people are rinsing out their containers,” said Macullo.
“Once an animal becomes food conditioned, it starts to rely more on human food and garbage and that can make them bolder and ultimately lead to destruction of the animal and/or conflict with humans,” she added,
“An incident like this can be avoided if people take the extra few minutes to do the right thing and rinse out their recycling.”
Parks Canada also wants to remind residents to take their garbage or recycling inside their house if the bins in their neighbourhood are full or overflowing.
“Those bins will be emptied, but not leaving garbage there or not putting it in when the lid can’t close can mean the difference between life and death for an animal,” said Macullo.
Parks Canada also asks residents to report all wildlife sightings within the townsite to 403-762-1470.
“When we received this call and responded, we found at that time this animal had been hanging around,” said Macullo. “That would have been good to know because we could have responded earlier and the situation maybe could have been avoided.”
