Grieving Pet Owner Sounds The Alarm Over San Francisco Coyotes
SAN FRANCISCO (CBS SF) – Liza Valdeolivar is grieving the loss of her best friend and doesn't want other pet owners to feel a similar pain.
So the San Francisco resident is raising the alarm about the dangers of coyotes within the city's parks.
Three months ago, Valdeolivar was walking her 9-year old 11-pound Yorkshire named Mya in Broderick Terry Park near Lake Merced.
She often walked her dog there. But on this day, a pack of coyotes was lying in wait.
"She was my best friend, I called her my 'sidekick,'" Valdeolivar told KPIX 5. "She was with me all the time. It happened as she was on her way to me. I had called her over."
As she watched in shock, the coyotes attacked.
"One of them picked her up by the neck. ... She was dangling," Valdeolivar said. "And ran up the bushy area and through a barbed wire fence where there's a hole."
Valdeolivar yelled and tried to scare the coyotes away from her pet.
"I'm yelling, I'm callilng her name," she said. "Yelling, yelling, yelling."
But her beloved dog was gone.
"I would like for people to be aware that there are animals out here and we are cohabitating with them," she said. "I wish I had known because I would never have put my dog in danger that way. I feel so responsible."
