Rabid Coyote Found in Pennsylvania

Rabies is sufficiently common in the Eastern United States that the handling of live raccoon, fox, groundhog, skunk or feral cat has to be treated with a great deal of caution.

If it is a mammal, it can get rabies. For some reason, probably low body temperature, possums almost never have rabies.

How common is rabies? Every once in a while, simply go to Google News and type in the word "rabies" and see how many states -- and which ones -- are reporting that week. It's generally pretty sobering.

As the coyote has come east, rabies has begun to infect this animal too. Though rabid coyote attacks on people are still very uncommon, this qualifies as a true wildlife nightmare.

The good news is that rabies infection rates are likely to spiral down in the new few years due to aerial innoculation (through bait) of wildlife populations. Though the effectiveness of oral vaccine is not nearly as high as that administered via a shot or jab, it is high enough that it is expected to break the back (at least for a while) of the widespread rabies pandemics we have had sweep through the eastern U.S. especially among raccoon populations.

Woman Slams Door on Aggressive Coyote -- from the Associated Press, Sep 29, 2006

SINKING SPRINGS, Pa. - When a man and his dog dashed into the house with a rabid coyote on their heels, his wife slammed the door on the coyote's neck.

Craig S. Luckenbill said Thursday that he ran to get his 12-gauge shotgun, and his wife managed to close the door, but the coyote continued biting at the door and the front of the house.

The coyote was in the front yard when Luckenbill went out and killed it with the shotgun, he said. "I'm a hunter but I've never seen anything like that."

The Pennsylvania Game Commission confirmed Wednesday that the 40-pound eastern coyote Luckenbill shot on Sept. 21 had rabies, the first coyote to test positive for rabies in the state.

Luckenbill said he had heard one of his dogs barking, found it fighting with the coyote near his patio and tried to pull the dog away, but the coyote followed until his wife trapped it in the door. "When it tried to come into the house, my other dog Annie got involved to protect my wife," he said.

Both dogs had been immunized for rabies and received booster shots after the attack, he said.