VEGETABLES AND COYOTES

I have a friend who is a vegetarian. Will eat cheese and dairy products, though. She is an avowed animal lover BUT, during a conversation today, told me that if a coyote, bobcat, or even a opossum were to threaten her cat or little doggies, she would have her friend who is a hunter come and shoot the wild critter. She and her husband live in a newly developed community of custom homes that occupy a once very rural area. I am sure many natural habitats were disturbed as a result of the new home building. It did come as a surprise to me that she was so vehement about killing an animal. My remark was that the coyote and the bobcat called her backyard home before she lived there, and that she and her domestic pets were the interlopers. Didn't win me any brownie points.

Read where wolves have been introduced back into the wild at Yellowstone National Park. The repopulating has been successful in the parks, but not so in the lower southwestern states that have ranches. Ranchers understandably carry the wolf and coyote in low esteem.

How quickly principles fly out the window when our own fragile little world is threatened. After getting over my shock at my friend's heartlessness, I realized that to her, the cat and dogs were her children. If a wild animal was a danger to my offspring, a double-barrel might be my choice, too. Aim low Sheriff, th'air a ridin' Shetlands!