No Wile E. Coyote: Watch Johnson County animal officer save coyote tangled in wire fence
‘Wile E. Coyote’ may have managed to get out of all sorts of scrapes with ease in the classic Looney Tunes cartoon, but it took a Johnson County animal control officer to recently rescue a coyote caught in barbed wire fence — and it was all caught on tape.
On Sept. 24, Deputy Dwayne Shoop, a former Johnson County Sheriff’s deputy turned animal control officer, was called to wrangle the American jackal that had been stuck for several hours near West 135th Street and South Spoon Creek Road.
Video of the encounter was posted by the sheriff’s office on social media.
“It’s typical,” the deputy later said about getting a call regarding a coyote.
After a call from the property owner, Shoop said he came upon the coyote that was hanging by its left leg in the fence. The coyote had a bewildered face with wide eyes and an open mouth as the deputy cut its left leg out of the wire.
The animal left the situation with a dislocated hip and severed tendon and was taken to Operation Wildlife for treatment, a nonprofit which provides rehabilitation and veterinary services to injured and orphaned wild animals.
Shoop was a patrol deputy for the sheriff’s office for 30 years before retiring. He jumped at the chance to work as the county’s lone animal control office, where he has been for almost two years, he said. Coyotes, cattle, raccoons and deer are among some of the animals he frequently gets calls for, he told The Star.
He tells people who come upon wild animals to simply leave them be and don’t feed them.
“We’re intruding on their territory more than they’re intruding on ours,” Shoop said. “They’ll never be fully domesticated, but they’re going to end up being more domesticated and depending on us. So let the wildlife be wildlife.”
This story was originally published September 28, 2024 at 7:00 AM.
