Wily in the pursuit of coyotes

Jimmie Rizzo traps coyotes throughout Southern California. The practice is controversial, with homeowners saying it protects their pets and animal advocates saying it's cruel and indiscriminate.

By Joe Mozingo
LA Times
January 26, 2009

Jimmie Rizzo puts a lump of chaw in his lip and picks his way into a ravine below a home in Redlands. Through a wrought-iron fence, a French bulldog named Phoebe yips, snorts and wheezes in her rhinestone collar. Rizzo tells her to shut up. He's here to help.

For years, coyotes have fed on pets in this hilltop neighborhood. When residents complain to the county, the county calls Rizzo.

The trapper, born and raised in the hardwood forests of the Mississippi Delta, specializes in California's big predators: coyotes, bears and mountain lions.

Bear and lion problems make news. Coyotes make business. Rizzo spends about 80% of his time tracking, trapping and putting down wild canids from Pacific Palisades to Twentynine Palms.

(More here.)