Eastern coyote
| Eastern coyote | |
|---|---|
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| An eastern coyote in the snow near the West Virginia-Virginia state line. | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Mammalia |
| Infraclass: | Eutheria |
| Order: | Carnivora |
| Family: | Canidae |
| Genus: | Canis |
| Species: | C. latrans |
| Subspecies: | C. latrans var. |
| Trinomial name | |
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Canis latrans var. Lawrence and Bossert, 1969 |
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The Eastern coyote (Canis latrans var.), also known as the Tweed Wolf, is a wild North American canine of mixed coyote-wolf and dog parentage that is present in New England, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania,Ohio,West Virginia,Maryland, Delaware and Virginia. They also range in the eastern Canadian provinces of Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick,Nova Scotia,Prince Edward Island, and Newfoundland and Labrador. It was first noticed during the early 1930s to the late 1940s, and likely originated in the aftermath of the extirpation of the eastern wolf in southeastern Ontario as well as the Labrador wolf in Labrador and Quebec, thus allowing coyotes to colonize the former wolf ranges and mix with the remnant wolf populations. This hybrid is smaller than the eastern wolf and holds smaller territories, but is larger and holds more extensive home ranges than the typical western coyote.
The canid has been referred to in scientific publications as Canis latrans, Canis latrans var, and Canis latrans × Canis lycaon and has been commonly referred to as the eastern coyote, the northeastern coyote, and the coywolf.
In 2014, a DNA study of northeastern coyotes showed them on average to be a hybrid of western coyote (62%), western wolf (14%), eastern wolf (13%), and domestic dog (11%) in their nuclear genome. The hybrid swarm extended into the midwestern United States, with Ohio coyotes shown on average to be a hybrid of western coyote (66%), western wolf (11%), eastern wolf (12%), and domestic dog (10%) in their nuclear genome. Coyotes and wolves first hybridized in the Great Lakes region, followed by a hybrid coyote expansion that created the largest mammalian hybrid zone known.
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Wikipedia