Scientists have found that "smallest known" coyote community located near Chicago's O'Hare International Airport.

According to estimates, about 2,000 coyotes live in the Chicago metro area, along with 9 million people in some 250 separate municipalities.

Stan Gehrt led the tracking of coyotes around Chicago for 12 years and he said that the coyotes do no have to go far to find food and water because they're finding their needs in the suburbs of Chicago. 

According to Gehrt, Coyotes are the largest of the mammalian carnivores to have made their way to, and thrived in, urban settings.

"The coyote is the test case for other animals," Gehrt said. Raccoons, skunks, foxes - they've already been able to penetrate the urban landscape pretty well. The coyote is the most recent and largest. The jury's out with what's going to happen with the bigger ones."

Gert and his team of scientists have been tracking urban coyotes since 200 and have captured and placed radio collars on about 680 coyotes, with 50 or 60 being tracked at any one time. 

For humans and animals, coexisting with each other can be pretty terrifying, but Gehrt said they "are probably going to have to get used to it."

"It used to be rural areas where we would have this challenge of coexistence versus conflict with carnivores," he said. "In the future, and I would say currently, it's cities where we're going to have this intersection between people and carnivores."

Gehrt said coyotes are not prone to attack humans. For those people who see a coyote and do feel threatened, waving one's arms and yelling, or even throwing a rock in its direction, will very likely scare the animal away.

"You're doing them a favor," Gehrt said. "They show a healthy respect and fear of people and that's the way it should be."

Gehrt said it was always assumed that only small carnivores could live in cities and in small numbers. He said scientists are finding that the animals can easily adjusting to city life and credit must be given to them. 

So, since the animals are flexible with their living adjustments, Gehrt said the burden is on the humans who need to figure out if we are going to be able to adjust to them living with us or are we not going to be able to coexist.

If the government was to intervene to get rid of city coyotes, it can be costly and might not be worth the benefit. 

According to Gehrt, when the study began in 2000, several communities around Chicago trapped and killed coyotes found within their boundaries. No, according to Gehrt's estimates, only 10 percent of communities have such programs in place now and he thinks those programs will go away, too. 

"It costs money, and it upsets some residents who want coyotes living there," Gehrt said. "So there is conflict, cost and lack of effectiveness. We have great data in areas where removal was done. You pull them out, and literally within just a few weeks, new coyotes moved in and set up a new pack and began reproducing right away.

Gehrt said both humans and animals have intruded on each other's space. 

"The funny thing is that now we have more people on earth and bigger cities than ever, we also now have carnivores moving into cities," Gehrt said. It's a two-way street: We're expanding cities into their territories and they're also coming in."

Gehrt said he found that the urban coyote pup survival rate is five times higher than the rate for rural pups. In both environments, humans are the coyotes' primary predator.

Gehrt said humans are slowing the coyote population with cars, which he said is the No. 1 cause of death for coyotes. Humans also slow the coyote population when they remove them through hunting or control programs. 

Gehrt said none of the diseases the coyotes are exposed to impact them.

According to Gehrt, coyotes are exposed to disease because they dine on rodents, rabbits and geese, providing a benefit by reducing human exposure to diseases carried by those species and removing animals otherwise considered a nuisance. They will also eat bugs and deer fawn, another potential benefit because human encounters with deer can be deadly, and will gorge on fruit if given the opportunity. They also eat the occasional cat or small dog.

"They're so adaptable and so opportunistic," Gehrt said. "In adjusting to urban life, they may change dietary items and habitat use, and become nocturnal, whereas in the country they're active day and night. But with other things, they don't change at all. Here, they're able to maintain their social structure, territorialism, packs and mating system, even in the face of all these challenges of trying to live among 9 million people."

Gehrt plans to observe coyotes in Cleveland, Ohio, and in Nova Scotia, where coyotes show more aggressiveness toward humans.