A Coyote Blessing

A prospective new addition to NE this week: another participant, spending the week with us to see how NE might work for and with her. We met at Gazos beach again, our mission to get to know individual coyotes using the five measurements: length and width of the front foot in a walk, length and width of the hind foot in a walk, and length of the stride in a direct register trot. We greeted the coyote tracks as we entered the beach, and got down to business. But before we'd gone along the coyote trails, we found this mystery:


The head was missing, and it had been long since eaten by it's killer and by insects. The shears on the wing feathers, though, looked fresher, with the inner part of the feather less weathered.


The foot, also, had been sheared clean through, as if by garden clippers. The inside of the bone was still red, while the rest of the soft tissues of the carcass had been weathered to brown or gray.


We found this creature along a coyote trail, where the canid had deviated from it's trot into a walk to approach the carcass, then resumed it's previous path and gait past the bird.


We found that and more mysteries on the dunes. We took measurements and sketched individual tracks. We worked past lunch, then the brain burn got to us. One by one we dropped our journals, our measuring tapes, and our pencils. One of our number stripped to his shorts and took a swim in the surf. Another lay down and considered the sand and the sky. Two others had already wandered off in pursuit of a raccoon trail. I sat down and ate my lunch.

After our interlude, we came back together to play the cluster tracking game. Once we finished and were about to start up the beach, someone shouted "look!" We all looked up at the trailhead in time to see the coyote bouncing down the trail in a neat side trot. He zigged and zagged, looked nervously over his shoulder, and showed off many of the other behaviors we had been tracking! When he disappeared into the dunes we rushed over to find his tracks, shouting our thanks to the coyote.

Later around the fire, we talked with our prospective new member about the Native Eyes experience, and about the day. I was in conversation with the new person about how our group has tracked together for ten weeks now. We've seen eachother hit walls already. But it probably wouldn't take long for her to mesh with us-- we were crying in front of eachother on the first day.

Jon joined us at the fire and also took up conversation with our newcomer. I'll try to summarize the conversation.

In Native Eyes, we cry easy and we laugh easy too. Our journeys into connection with nature bring us into contact with powerful experiences that are our birthright. These powerful experiences make us quick to laugh, celebrate, give thanks, and make fun. For most of us, these experiences were stripped from our cultures in violent conquests generations ago. So this understanding also brings us into generations-old grief over what we have lost. For many of us that grief is close to the surface and can easily spill over in tears.

People may expect this program to work within the conqueror model of education that prevails through most of our culture. Compromise with the conqueror model helps those of us who grew up conquered stave off the grief of realizing what we've missed. But it also keeps us from the powerful nature connection experiences that give us back what we've been missing. Native Eyes is one program where they won't compromise. They notice that grief comes up, and keep up the coyote mentoring anyway.

Creeks and coyotes

The sun sported a halo on Tuesday as we started tracking on the beach. One group stayed by the trailhead to map the copious coyote trails there, and my group journeyed north, hoping to find another coyote hot spot.


Past the center of coyote action, not even a lone canid trail traveled the beach. Another critter was out, though, traveling oddly like a coyote in a straight line across the sand. The critter seemed to be moving in an overstep two-by-two pace.


For a while, the most prevalent tracks were tiny, three-toed blips in the sand. This little dude flew in and paced around at about the same cadence as the tracks, bobbing his head and scouting for invertebrate prey.


When he flew on to find more food, we found these tracks in his wake. The same tracks!


Just south of Gazos Creek we went inland toward Gazos Grill, checking for trails toward the grill's dumpster. A wide, low trail cut through the poison oak and was covered with little five-fingered handprints -- a raccoon's run. On the beach side of the road, the only larder we could find was a wild rose decked with fruit. A few coyote trails crisscrossed, but we found no scent marking or interaction.


The only scent post we found was this old bobcat latrine.


We crossed Gazos Creek flowing fast and cold over the beach sand, and found a raven party on the flat expanse.


Following the ravens, we found logs with interesting little burrows beneath them, full of little caches of sea rocket seed pods.


We continued for a long way up the beach. The high tide had wiped away all tracks.


As we moved further north, the cliffs to the east began dripping, dribbling and leaking water down to the sand. We wondered if that water would be safe to drink.



We began to notice coyote trails traveling north or south just under the high tide mark.


We found a bird kill and then another, with coyote trails veering through the scattered feathers but not pausing in their cadence.


The bird below had a fascinating bill.


Finally we came to another creek flowing from a low place in the cliffs and disappearing into the beach sand. Coyote trails upon coyote trails converged from the washed-out surf zone up toward and along the creek.



We followed up the creek, clambering over driftwood and mini waterfalls on a carpet of watercress.


Around a corner in the waterway, there was a shelf of mudstone. On the shelf were the remains of a seabird, the feathers gnawed and sheared at the base.



With some measurements of the coyote trails and a general mental map of the area, we returned south to meet up with our companions.



We spent the evening mapping our wander, building a fire, cooking and debriefing the day with Jon.