The Last Big Howl

 Just because I'm a conservative doesn't mean I'm not a conservationist and that I don't love animals.  

Where I live a few months back in February a HUGE pack of coyotes came at the rear of my apartment complex and howled.  I guess it was breading season.  There were a lot of them.  I heard them move off and howl a few more times as they moved off.  Since then I've heard a few barks and howls here and there.

I'm afraid for this pack of coyotes, this year was the last big howl.  Since the beginning of the year acre after acre blocks have gone into construction for MILES around where I live in Northern Phoenix.  I look at them and see their hunting territory being eviscerated.  Also since the howl I've seen coyote corpse on the side of the road after coyote corpse.  The remaining coyotes that don't starve, succumb, or move on will become more aggressive due to their starving and will be dealt with as nuisance predators.  Otherwise proud predators whose descendants have lived in the area for probably thousands of years that normally shied away from people and domestic animals will now become aggressive.  Some will be hunted down "humanely" and euthanized.  The remaining few that eek out and existence as nocturnal ghost living off of lost cats and whatever small rodents remain in the area.  They will be skinny shades of their ancestors.

It all makes me sad.  I know coyotes don't know that I care.  I also know if they could they would eat me and my dog.  But I wanted to put down somewhere that one of the human beings that is destroying their lands took notice of them and was sad.  I bare witness to the last great howl, and my thoughts and prayers go with them.  They are doomed, but I hope one day in the future when Jesus returns that humans and animals can live in the balance they were intended to live in.  I heard the howl.  It sticks with me as a reminder that this world is fallen and helps me look forward to the new world to come.