Canadian man rescues a dog he accidentally hit with his car- except that...

[Bogertophis]

I rescued a coyote once. It had tried to get an animal in a lose 15' piece of the black flexible drainage pipe. It was in the winter with about a foot of snow on the ground and the coyote was able to push its head into the tube but ended up getting stuck. It was at my boss's house at the time. When he came in in the morning he told me about a raccoon that was flipping around in a big pipe all over his yard through the night, he said he thought it was dead this morning but I asked if I could go try to help it and he let me. As soon as I saw it I knew it was a coyote not a raccoon. I didn't want to get bit but I wanted to try to save it. It wasn't dead, just exhausted. It's head had become frozen to the pipe so I couldn't just pull it off. I had to pour warm water on the pipe a couple buckets worth before it started to come off. It was still stuck real good though and since the coyote wasn't struggling much I decided to save it I was going to need to hold it and pull on the pipe. I struggled to get it of for a while and was getting less and less cautious as I tried. When i finally got it to pop free i ended up in a super vulnerable position where i had the coyote in my one arm and my other arm braced the pipe as it pulled off and ended up face to face with the coyote. To my surprise it just stared eye to eye with me for about 20 seconds while I tried not to make a move. It's almost like it knew I was trying to help, didn't even grawl, just stared at me within inches of my face and then just turned around and trotted off into the forest. Pretty amazing experience. They are beautiful animals and I never realized how bright their eyes are until being up close like that. Great feeling to save an animal that for sure would of died without your help.

Wild animals of all kinds never cease to amaze me in their apparent capacity to comprehend that we're there to help them. I know similar things have happened with sea
creatures too, like those that get stuck in nets that divers help to free. What an awesome experience you had with that coyote, thanks for sharing it.
The lasting good feeling that comes from such encounters is almost beyond words...

I don't doubt for a moment that in both cases the coyote realized it was being helped by a human, & that many animals have far more intelligence that most humans choose to acknowledge. I had lots of coyote neighbors when I lived in the high desert, & these stories really make me miss seeing them around.