A coyote prowls near Los Angeles, Calif.
Grumpy White’s has a coyote problem. The restaurant in Quincy, Massachusetts, has been getting nightly visitors from a few coyotes who live in the woods behind the pub’s parking lot. The feral animals — two adult coyotes and three pups have been spotted there this week — are scaring the patrons and the staff. Luckily the restaurant’s owner has a plan: mountain lion urine.
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Bob White, the owner (and possibly the namesake, we wonder?) of Grumpy White’s, hung bottles of mountain lion urine around the restaurant’s property in hopes of chasing away the family of coyotes who have been loitering around the perimeter. “They just sit here and look at you. They’re not scared at all,” White told NECN. His ploy may be working, too: the urine smell seems to be deterring the animals from sticking around the restaurant south of Boston. “I saw one yesterday, just one. I think the adults know what the scent is but the babies don’t yet. I think maybe the adults will eventually take the babies out of here,” White told CBS Boston.
Why would a small business owner resort to hanging bottles of cat pee from a tree? Because mountain lions are a coyote predator — and their urine is a known animal deterrent, at least according to Predator Pee, an online clearinghouse for, you guessed it, predator’s pee. Coyotes recognize the scent of their natural enemy and flee before they are forced to face their predator. White might have done better to check the Predator Pee guide, though: it notes the urine from a wolf (a competitor of the mountain lion) is the most successful coyote deterrent — which they also sell. This just goes to show that, if you happen to be in the market, Predator Pee also sells the urine of foxes, bobcats, fishercats, and bears to deter a variety of prey ranging from coyotes to mice, geese and even wild boar.
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If the predator pee doesn’t work, and the animals begin to pose a threat to patrons or staff, Grumpy White’s may have to call in state wildlife officials. The Massachusetts Environmental Police told CBS Boston that they are keeping an eye on the coyotes at Grumpy White’s. There are about 10,000 coyotes living in Massachusetts, mostly in urban and suburban areas like Quincy because that’s where food is easy to find. Officials say in the last 60 years, only five people have been bitten by a coyote in Massachusetts.
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