It’s been weeks since Samantha Webster has walked her seven-pound Yorkie at night.

For 30 years, she’s heard the howls of the coyotes in the distance in the late hours, ringing out in her otherwise quiet Whitby neighbourhood. But those howls have become louder in recent months — and it was the sounds of a coyote mauling a rabbit in her backyard that scared her into quitting her usual dog walking routine.