The Toronto skyline isn't any higher than the tops of the old growth trees, where ravines extended south from the Oak Ridges Moraine all the way to the waterfront and the streams and rivers flow free and clean. The cultural diversity Toronto is known for only extends to the different native tribes of the area. Your backyard is part of the lush system of wetlands that hasn't felt the weight of pavement on top of it. And it is filled with dog-friendly parks; wolf packs choose where they're allowed to go.
This is Toronto, before the Europeans.
For thousands of years, little had changed in the Toronto area. Once the Ice Age glaciers retreated, leaving a newly crafted land, the old wildlife hierarchies began to crumble. The massive prehistoric mammals were dying out, and the modern animals began to take over. Native North American species such as cougars, black bears, and white-tailed deer began to flourish alongside animals recently migrated from Eurasia across Beringia, the land bridge between Siberia and Alaska.
When the gray wolf came to North America, it became the continent's dominant canine predator, filling the void left in the demise of the prehistoric dire wolf. The wolf thrived with abundant prey and no natural predators. But as the North American wilderness began to be tamed by the European settlers, things changed for the gray wolf.
As Toronto Zoo Curator of Conservation Programs Dave Ireland explains, the settlers began a culling of the wolves. Though wolf hunting was popular as a sport for the upper-class in Europe, it was the frontier villagers in the new world who took up arms. Wolves, as well as other predators such as bears, were seen as threats to the frontier settlements. Wolf bounties began to be issued throughout America in the mid-1600s, and in Canada less than two centuries later. And as beaver populations diminished in the New World due to over-trapping, the wolf pelt trade began to boom, turning wolf hunting into a profitable business for both natives and colonists alike.
But it wasn't just the end of a hunter's rifle that forced wolves into more remote locations. Ireland points out that wolf packs require large tracts of land to hunt. Wolves need to stay on the move, following the deer or moose they usually prey upon. But as the human settlements grew and tamed the surrounding wilderness, the wolves' hunting patterns were interrupted. Wolves, unlike other species, were not able to adapt to coexist with humans, new apex predators of North America. The wolf was forced far away from civilization.
The disappearance of wolves allowed for the rise of a new canine species. Before Europeans arrived in the new world, the coyote was limited to the southwestern United States. Unlike wolves, who weren't used to competition and becoming prey, coyotes — the resourceful tricksters of Native American folklore and what Ireland calls
an "opportunistic" omnivore — flourished because of their ability to adapt to live in the shadows of more powerful predators.
In a 2007 report, Valerius Geist, Professor Emeritus of Environmental Studies at the University of Calgary, wrote that native species evolved to be resourceful enough to survive in an Ice Age North America controlled by giant prehistoric predators. Since the gray wolf was one of Eurasia's dominant predators, which arrived in North America after the Ice Age giants began to die out, it never had natural enemies to learn to coexist with.
But the adaptable coyote can quickly find new ways to survive when there are changes in its environment. In an article published in Zoogoer, the Smithsonian's zoological magazine, a case is documented in which Canadian gray wolves were introduced into Yellowstone National Park, and within three years the coyote population changed its behaviour to avoid the wolves.
The article says that after being targeted by the wolves and losing almost half of their numbers, the remaining coyotes began to spend more time in steep terrain and outwitted the wolves by leading wolves in pursuit downhill only to change direction and begin climbing back up, knowing that the heavier and less maneuverable animals couldn't stop as quickly, letting the coyote gain a big lead.
As the European settlers began to exterminate and push out the wolf population, it set the stage for coyotes to begin expanding their territory. Ireland explains that it took coyotes only about 100 years to spread across the majority of North America and become the dominant canine predator.
Coyotes still thrive in and around Toronto. They hunt pest rodents and have learned to live off of human refuse when possible. Though coyotes were naturally diurnal, they now hunt at night, usually remaining unseen by their human neighbours (notwithstanding Neville, the coyote whose sightings in the Beaches made headlines this past spring).
Though many species of predators have flourished in and near our urban environments, and may not be frightened by people, they are by no means tame and can still be dangerous.