Still Wild At Heart: An interview with an SF coyote crusader

Imagine: a coyote in your very own backyard. A special piece of wildlife that remains wild, even within the most congested and seemingly inhospitable of environments. A sentinel canine cruising the crest of one of San Francisco's smallest and most city-locked open space preserves. Now, enter a fellow neighbor named Melissa Peabody . . . an inspired producer and film editor, so transfixed by the sight of the animal that she makes this particular coyote the subject of an elegant documentary on urban wildlife. Newly released, this film pays homage to the little traveler who could, to the coyote that made a dash for the hilly bullocks of Bernal Heights one day in 2003 and never looked back. It is also a refreshing look at how wild animals and humans can coexist happily and peacefully within the confines of a concrete jungle.

"San Francisco: Still Wild At Heart" is Peabody's "Silent Spring" for the educated city dweller, the occasional environmentalist that sometimes forgets to bring a reusable sack to the grocery store, who hasn't yet switched from a 20 MPG gas guzzling Camaro with a V8 engine to a denim blue-colored (and, as the green energy group espouses, the proletarian blue-collared) Prius, and who still pitches away $5 a day for a glass of Chardonnay at the corner bar's happy hour rather than emptying the funds into Green Peace's coffers. It's a documentary that is effective simply because it does not try to be. It presents a natural problem that is increasing in incidence, offers viable suggestions for handling the issues in a positive way, and allows the viewer to react freely to the facts presented without coercion. This isn't PETA with rotten eggs and a can of red spray paint; this is Peabody with a handheld camera and a passion for a rather comfortable-looking coyote. (If she happened to shoot footage of the coyote receiving hillside handouts of Purina and prosciutto - those Bernal Heights folks have good taste, even if they don’t keep their coyote distance - she isn't telling, and she certainly isn't showing it, lest she be pulling strips of wet toilet paper out of her trees with tweezers for the next year.) Like good fences, a bit of documentary discretion makes for good neighbors.

I had the good fortune to catch up with Peabody at a books-y little cafe tucked onto a side street of her neighborhood, at the very foot of the Bernal Heights open space where the star of her documentary resides. It was a rare warm and sunny day in the city when she came in with her twin sons, herself sporting a breezy white blouse set in motion by swirling coral flowers. With her sun-touched blonde hair and casual exuberance, she was a summer afternoon personified. While the boys ate nearby, we sat and chatted about Peabody's project and the history of the Bernal Heights coyote, who I'll refer to as "Bernie."

Peabody has lived in San Francisco for almost 20 years. She spent the first seven years of her life in Farmington, New Mexico, near the Four Corners area, a place well-known in ancient Indian folklore and current suburban legends as a coyote hotbed. Still, it wasn't until Bernie took up residence on the hill behind her San Francisco home that she saw her first wild coyote in the flesh, err, fur. And she was smitten.

Up to that point, she had edited mostly ocean and marine life nature documentaries and hadn't seen cause to expand her view. "And then, the coyote showed up on our hill," Peabody said with a smile. Quickly, things began to change.

"I know this sounds crazy," she said, but "the actual look in the coyote's eyes" when she first saw him stirred something in her. There was a depth to his gaze that Peabody connected with at once. Soon after that chance meeting with Bernie she took her sons, then eight, up on the hill to catch a glimpse of the intriguing new addition to the park. Little did they know that they would be embarking on a journey with their mom that would bring them face-to-face with not just Bernie, but coveys of cooing quail, flocks of cheeky parrots, and a host of other wild animals living within the not-so-wild walls of an urban enclave. It would be a transforming experience for everyone involved.

Peabody's hour-long documentary focuses about 50% of the time on coyotes, but at the outset these carnivores weren't even slated for a cameo appearance. "It [Wild At Heart] was only going to be half an hour . . . and then the coyote hijacked the film!" Peabody laughed, her blue eyes dancing. Bernie trotted into her life at just the right time, and she saw the power of using the image of a resilient, often-persecuted animal - that just so happens to bear a striking resemblance to a runty Border Collie - as a vehicle for teaching the public about responsible wildlife stewardship. The relatively recent influx of coyotes into urban environments all over the country makes the release of her piece especially timely. "I feel like it kind of really brings to this visible point how coyotes and humans fight over resources," she said.

For the coyotes, learning to live around humans involves a transition period where they must adapt to hunting, sleeping, and traveling within their new locale. "People seem to need time to make that transition, too," Peabody added thoughtfully. Only for humans the learning curve seems to be taking a little longer. Through "Wild At Heart," Peabody hopes to educate city slickers on the behavior changes they'll need to make so that man and beast can live side-by-side in a blended habitat. The two most important rules, with regards to coyotes, are to keep cats in the house and dogs on a leash, and to never, never, ever feed the coyotes. This not only makes them dependent on humans for handouts (with possible deleterious effects on their health), but it also erases their fear of man, which can lead to too-close encounters of the canine kind. A toddler with a taco in hand suddenly looks like a lunch cart vendor, and the coyote may inadvertently injure a small and unaware child as she grabs for her next meal.

Rest assured, stories of coyote attacks are very few, and very far between. Bernie, now in his fifth year of Bernal Heights habituation, has done a just dandy job of managing his heavily-used space with minimal interaction. "He has not attacked any dogs yet!" Peabody announced with all the pride of a den mother. He's even left the neighbor's big white cat alone that roams the grassy knoll daily, despite Peabody's strong warning to the snackalicious pet's owner. Peabody was even privy to witness an extraordinary event involving Bernie and another neighbor's dog that proves just how little distance lies between wild and domestic dogs.

"I have a theory borne of seeing unusual things with coyotes," she began, with perhaps the most unusual thing involving Bernie "attempting to play with the neighbor's fat little girl dog" while the neighbor's male dog barked and growled, either in territorial aggression or just plain old jealousy. "At first I didn't believe it," Peabody said, but on that evening walk, seeing was definitely believing. Due to the coyote's size and playful demeanor towards the female dog, Peabody thinks Bernie is most likely a "he." Still, she advises keeping dogs well away from the wild coyote. There's no good reason to tempt fate and possibly ruin the good thing that both Bernie and the folks of Bernal Heights have going. Announcing that you have a healthy coyote in your background carries a modicum of cache, especially at environmentalist-heavy cocktail parties.

But why the playful advances to the local girls? Perhaps Bernie's lonely, and just wants a mate. Maybe in the past five years he hasn’t so much lounged around in the grass (as coyotes usually do when not at hunt), but has busied himself with building an elaborate subterranean Taj Mahal under Bernal Hill, with the hopes of finding a worthy lady coyote to share his fairy-tale perch with. I don't imagine many other contenders could offer such an amazing piece of prize real estate to their prospective mates, coyote or human, so if Bernie can coax a female coyote through the perils of cross-city traffic, he'll be the hottest catch on the coyote market - paws down. Not to mention that he's now a film star!

If you would like to learn more about the San Francisco coyote and urban wildlife, you may purchase the “San Francisco: Still Wild At Heart” DVD from Melissa Peabody. Email her at mpeabody@pacbell.net.

Photo credits: Anna Kuperberg

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