The Ogden based Wildlife Rehabilitation Center of Northern Utah works to care for the injured critters of varying species. However, when a coyote comes through the doors, they have few choices as state law requires them to euthanize the animal with few exceptions.

“For some reason they consider things nuisances even if they are a natural, wild animal that belongs out there,” said Buz Marthaler, co-founder and chair of the rehab center. This also applies to red foxes.

Marthaler said that if a coyote is suffering, the center can euthanize the animal. Under very specific circumstances they will be allowed to care for it.

“They would not allow us to release it back into the wild,” he said, “it would have to go to a zoo or something like that.”

Utah has a complicated relationship with its natural predators, placing bounties on cougars beginning last year and on coyotes for over a decade. Both of these programs have seen unintended consequences.

Since 2012 Utah has offered payment to hunters bringing in coyote jaws under the “Predator Control Program.” These hunters are not required to have a license and the program was initially introduced to increase mule deer populations.

Recent studies have found that coyote populations actually increased in areas where they are hunted, while mule deer populations have seemed unaffected. State officials say there are many factors beyond predation that impact mule deer populations and wildlife experts say the best way to manage predators is to leave them alone.

Austin Trottier says he hunts coyotes twice a year but didn’t know he could get paid or hunt them out of season. He has already made plans to hunt for the bounty this year. The program has been suspended until June due to funding running out.

“I know they are a nuisance and can obviously cause issues for farmers and stuff,” Trottier said. He feels the program gives hunters an incentive to kill coyotes, which he thinks will aid the environment.

Kirk Robinson, executive director of Western Wildlife Conservancy, strongly disagrees that hunting predators will help the environment. He explained the negative impact the removal of predators has on the entire ecosystem and eventually human civilizations.

Robinson cited the hunting of wolves in Yellowstone as an example. He explained how the extinction of wolves had led to flooding as the system was disturbed with an overpopulation of prey animals such as elk.

“With the reintroduction of wolves, this has changed a little bit towards the direction that it once was. It has not completely recovered and it may never completely recover,” Robinson said.

While predators are one thing that can be a factor, climate is also a large factor in the population of the mule deer this program was set to protect.

“Predators are one aspect of their population,” Department of Natural Resources Mammal Coordinator Chad Wilson said. “Probably the main things that drive deer populations are habitat and weather.”

The lowest years of deer population coordinated with record breaking winters, he said, and could likely be attributed to that. Deer populations were estimated at 324,000 in 2025 and 384,000 10 years earlier in 2015. This was still an improvement from when the program was introduced in 2012 and the numbers were near 318,550.

Populations were highest in 2015 and lowest in 2023 with over 100,000 fewer deer.

While coyote populations are not tracked, research has found something interesting happens when they are hunted. A 2025 study by the University of Utah found that in areas where coyotes are hunted, their numbers actually appear larger.

One of these researchers, Austin Green, called this “coyote math,” where hunting of coyotes could lead to larger litters and changes in birth rates.

“It’s important to note, too, that sometimes that could be misleading,” Green said. “Because there’s a chance that coyote populations are already naturally high in areas that are hunted by humans. So we can’t ignore that possibility as well.”

Robison fully believes that coyote math is to blame and numbers are rising. He cited anecdotes of seeing coyotes in cemeteries in pursuit of mule deer. He said he was reminded of a saying he heard, “You kill one coyote and two will come to its funeral.” He does not believe humans could extinguish coyotes because of this, he said.

While Robinson is finding more coyotes, hunters such as James Burgett have reported seeing more prey since the introduction of the program. He says he has seen an increase of not only mule deer but pheasants and rabbits as well.

Burgett is a gunsmith and outfitter and while he has not hunted coyotes himself, he has helped many others prepare for the hunt. He said that most hunters he knows are not driven by the bounty.

“The bounty is not a whole lot,” he said. “It’s $50 per head in some areas and $100 in others. So I mean, feasibly, theoretically, if you are a really good hunter, you could make a little bit of money, but I don’t usually see the monetary side of it.”

Burgett said his customers are sometimes farmers wanting to protect their livestock, but often are avid conservationists.

“What a lot of people forget is that we are a part of this ecosystem as well … I feel like the government has put in these regulations to help moderate and everything, but if you took out the human equation completely, you would have suffering on all sides of the spectrum.”

Robinson believes the best way to manage predators is to leave them alone. He explained the ways animals manage their own populations, such as fighting for territories with these fights often ending in death. He said predators such as mountain lions are essential in controlling diseases among deer herds and that decisions on their hunting should be made by experts, not legislators.

“These legislators are the ones that ultimately dictate how the wildlife management agency will operate,” Robinson said.

Robinson explained that these decisions are made by the Wildlife Board which he has served on the nominating committee for. While the board does take input from the Division of Wildlife Resources’ biologists, they also take input from hunters and the general public. He said that while serving, the acting chair talked the board into voting in his friend, a retired car salesman, over a fisheries ecologist with over 100 published articles in professional journals.

Robinson said that besides leaving predators alone, the best way to manage them is to provide the DWR with more funding and allow their biologists to make the decisions that impact Utah’s natural world.