Is there a coyote in your backyard? Chances are you do share space with these highly adaptable and smart wild relatives of your family dog. You may not have seen them around because coyotes mostly roam their territories at night, looking for food. They eat rabbits, groundhogs, mice, voles, deer, birdseed, unprotected garbage and vegetables from your compost pile. They may even dine on your free-roaming cat or small dog. 

It might un-nerve you to know that coyotes prowl your property as you sleep, but you should not consider them a threat. Rather, think of them as good neighbors. They are just like any other New Hampshire citizen who wants to get a place of his own, find true love and raise a nice family. But, for coyotes to achieve this bliss, they must be social and hook up with other coyotes in the area. And, like many people today, coyotes meet others by creating a MySpace page.
 

When you walk outside these days, the cooler air and colorful leaves clearly indicate change. You can feel excitement brewing in the forests and fields as animals begin to roam in search of food to fatten up for the upcoming winter challenges. This foraging behavior is not limited to the feathered and furred, though. It also applies to political animals as they grub across the Granite State, fattening up on public support in preparation for the challenging primary season.

Life is unfair enough without having cheaters in the game. Recent sports scandals involving doping and game-fixing has left fans wondering if they are the dopes for cheering on a bunch of crooks. It turns out that nature has its own share of scandalous cheaters who rig the game in their favor. Perhaps, by examining these wild cheaters, we can gain better insight on how to clean up professional sports.

Ecologists have termed nature’s cheaters “aggressive mimics.” These are creatures that disguise themselves as other animals to gain a deadly advantage. Put simply, they are real world examples of “wolves is sheep’s clothing.”