From the OUTDOOR HUB:

Part of Utah’s new Mule Deer Protection Act is the Predator Control Program. The new program is meant to open coyote control to the public for the benefit of mule deer.

After completing an online registration form and a training program, hunters can begin to remove coyotes. Participants of the program will receive $50 for each properly documented coyote they kill in Utah. July 1 is the first day to register, but reimbursements will not be distributed until after September 1, 2012. The Utah Division of Wildlife Resources (DWR) is targeting coyotes in a recommended removal zone based on the areas that are important to mule deer.

Coyotes have high reproductive potential and have proven to be difficult to hunt. Typically they produce more than six pups per year often kill deer fawns. On an informational website about the Predator Control Program, the DWR admits it will be impossible to remove all coyotes from Utah.

To be most effective, the DWR suggests taking the coyotes between December through June. Coyotes mate during the winter, usually in January and February, so the most effective control method will be to remove coyotes after pairs bond and territories are set and before pups are raised. Late summer is generally a less effective time for removing coyotes. This is when most wander and disperse, dying of natural causes as they try to find new territory.

Governor Gary Herbert signed the Mule Deer Protection Act (Senate Bill 245) into law on March 17, alongside a bill to fund the predator program by adding a $5 fee on big game permits (Senate Bill 87).

More on the program from the Utah Division of Resources:

Coyote Control Program

Sounds like a great plan. I don't really want to see coyotes completely exterminated everywhere, but like any other species their numbers have to be kept within reasonable limits. Too many places have too many coyotes and with fur prices being non-existant, there has to be some sort of incentive to get coyote numbers to a more reasonable level.

Waste o' money. Random coyote control has no effect on big game pops. Targeted and intense predator removal by professional hunters/trappers does work, but bounties generally don't work.

If i was a Utah taxpayer, I'd be unhappy about this misuse of state money.

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Originally posted by hartfish:
Waste o' money. Random coyote control has no effect on big game pops. Targeted and intense predator removal by professional hunters/trappers does work, but bounties generally don't work.

If i was a Utah taxpayer, I'd be unhappy about this misuse of state money.

A bounty on developers building houses on winter range would be more effective...

The last post fails to tell everyone the whole deal on this Utah bounty. When the SFW and Don Peay, it's founder, promoted it there was to be no cost to hunters or taxpayers and they stated it would double the deer herd within several years which is absolute BS. By the time the thing passed, a $5 per license surcharge fee was instituted to bring in about 1/2 million dollars and another Senator got a bill passed that appropriated another 1/2 million dollars out of the General Fund (taxpayers money!). As stated above, unless there is an all out war on yotes with paid aerial gunning, etc. this money will be a waste. I wonder how they will tell what state a yote came from if an adjoining Wyoming NR or Colorado "scalper" cheats and brings a bunch in to get the Utah $50 per head bounty!

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but bounties generally don't work.

But in this day and time with the shape our economy is in, it might be different. $50.00 is a pretty good incentive for many folks.

I can pretty well guarantee you that in the part of Texas where I live coyotes would become an endangered species because folks would be hunting them 24/7/365.

What keeps bounties from working revolves around the way the system is set up. If all a person has to do is kill the critter. load it up and take it tpo a local check station and get cash, the coyote population would go to dwindling.

Any system any goverment sets up is subject to flaws but with a little forethought things can b er made work. Such as no scalps/ears, the whole critter has to be brought in, fresh not frozen. Yes it would be smelly, but it might cut down on the number of junior achievers hauling in a bunch of scalps from road kills from the surrounding states.

Also, bounties paid to Non-Residents should or would be based on whether they held a Utah Big Game license of any kind. A Non-resident small game license would not qualify.

For these type programs to work, exclusions have to be made to try and prevent the types of fraud i.e. bringing in scalps from Wyoming, from taking place. If they are going to permit non-residents to participate then they will have to figure out anothe way of monitoring where the animals are coming from.

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Originally posted by Crazyhorseconsulting:
Sounds like a great plan. I don't really want to see coyotes completely exterminated everywhere, but like any other species their numbers have to be kept within reasonable limits. Too many places have too many coyotes and with fur prices being non-existant, there has to be some sort of incentive to get coyote numbers to a more reasonable level.

The fur market has swung back around lately, the 2012 Utah Trapper's Association fur action showed 892 coyote pelts went for an average of $48.06, with a high of $183.50. This program is like a $50 bonus for those folks who should not loose too much of pelt value if it's missing the ears and scalp.

Coyotes are not protected in Utah and can be hunted without a license, year round. I have a hard time believing that $50 is going to be enough incenctive to make any significant ADDITIONAL dent in the total coyote take. The biggest opportunity for additional take will be during hunting seasons when many sportsmen are afield hunting something else. How many of them are going to "risk"/bother shooting a coyote if it means scaring off the deer, bear, etc. they are after? Even after they do shoot one, they still have to do some work to earn their $50. I think this is more of a "feel good" idea than one that will produce measurable results.

I read a report that said it takes removing something like 70% of a coyote population for three years in a row in order to have a lasting effect on that local population. Part of the argument is that average litter size increases to offset population decreases. I really don't see this program achieving anything close to that, but even if it only gets a few additional youth hunters interested in hunting/trapping then it's a good thing.

Erict, the problem is, in many places fur buyers no longer come into the area to buy pelts.

Shooting a coyote or anything else is not going to scare off nothing, ever watched animals during a thunderstorm? If folks are given an incentive to shoot coyotes it will make a difference.

Offer a $50.00 bounty here in Texas and coyotes will go on the endangered species list in short order.

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Originally posted by Crazyhorseconsulting:
Offer a $50.00 bounty here in Texas and coyotes will go on the endangered species list in short order.

not a chance,IMHO.If that would work,they should have one on pigs.

jb, think what you want it don't matter to me, but without a bounty, just about everyone that I deal with shoots coyotes on sight.

We still have quite a few coyotes down here in some areas, but in some places it is pretty thin, and yes a bounty on pigs would thin those critters down.

When the prices being paid for feral hogs goes up, the trappers hammer on them pretty hard and they do reduce the numbers. But when the prices drop, the trappers stop doing their thing and the pigs start rebuilding their population.

The only thing that would keep/might keep a bounty from working down here is the amount of private land, but with the economy the way it is $50.00 a head for coyotes is an incentive that lots of people would go after.

I am in the field daily and with a conserted effort coyotes can be eradicated, feral hogs could be eradicated, I can remember when therter were no or very few feral hogs in north Texas. land owners want the hogs gone or the numbers greatly reduced but they also see the chance to make $$$$ off the critters. If they saw that they could make $$$ off the coyotes they would go after it.

I have to respectfully disagree with you CHC. Short of aerial gunning and possibly poisoning, the latter of which isn't going to happen, coyotes will continue to be around in good numbers even with that bounty system. As far as hogs and the way they multiply so fast, it will take a lot of aerial gunning like they've started doing down your way to knock the population way down. The problem with that method is that you have to catch them out or move them out into a fairly decent opening. As I'm sure you're well aware, many areas where yotes and hogs are thriving are so thick you're lucky to see one, which makes aerial gunning difficult, if not impossible. I will be very surprised if we don't read about a helicopter accident one of these days the way they are flying now on these paid shoots. That's the main reason people have used corn feeders for years in Texas to draw deer out because without it even seeing deer can be very difficult. I'm also sure you well know that in wet years the deer don't come to feeders nearly as much as in dry ones.

erict, In the past we have had to turn in the tails or scalp of a dog to get the bounty. The new system allows us to just turn in the lower jaw and have the ears marked. I and my hunting buddies have never been able to get bounty and sell the fur so we are losing our minds over this. I will be settin extra traps this year.

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I am in the field daily and with a conserted effort coyotes can be eradicated, feral hogs could be eradicated

I don't think either species can be eradicated by just public hunting or trapping, even with bounties or aerial hunting. It was attempted in the past with coyotes in TX and elsewhere using methods that were a lot more efficient, ie; compound 1080 and other poison laced bait stations.

Even during the era of high fur prices and cheap gas of the 70's and 80's the coyote population expanded nationally and they continue to do so.

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the problem is, in many places fur buyers no longer come into the area to buy pelts.

They don't need to when a fur taker can ship direct to an auction house like NAFA or FHA. The problem in TX is that your fur is a pretty low grade.

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and prevent the types of fraud i.e. bringing in scalps from Wyoming, from taking place.

Technology can help a lot with that, DNA and isotopic analysis are now pretty common in wildlife forensics and as evidence for the prosecution. They can pretty much tell where that coyote is from using that technology and they already have the databases of material to do so.

Anybody caught trying to launder coyotes caught in another state through UT to get the state bounty can face not only state prosecution but Federal as well since it would constitute a Lacey Act violation.