Coyote purge begins after attacks on Canmore kids

Wildlife officersare hunting down coyotes in the Canmore area after three children were attacked in one week.

A 10-year-old boy was bitten by a coyote at a crowded community skating party on Wednesday night in Canmore, which isabout 100 kilometres west of Calgary. People managed to chase it away but the animal returned later and grabbed a four-year-old boy by his jacket.

Adults tossed snowballs at the coyote which finally ran away, said Darcy Whiteside, spokesman for Alberta Sustainable Resource Development.

The boys were taken to hospital but were not seriously injured.

Wildlife officers said a booming rabbit populationmight be drawing more of the predators into town than normal.They saidacoyote attack in a crowd is highly unusual.

"They'll stay away from noises. They'll stay away from large crowds. They're typically scavengers or prey on small animals such as small rabbits and gophers and other rodents like that," said Whiteside.

A 13-year-old girl was attacked by a coyote as she playedat a snow fort inher front yard on Sunday night.

"She was yelling for help," saidLoretta Shortt, the girl's mother."The coyote just nailed her on the side."

The animal grabbed her by her coat but she was not badly hurt, said Shortt.

The three cases are the only reports of coyotes attacking people in Alberta this year.

Officers have been dispatched to kill all coyotes in the area, said Whiteside.

"It's basically the only thing that we can do because there's no real way to say whether this coyote is the cause of it or not," he said.