Taylor Mitchell

Taylor Mitchell

Taylor Mitchell
Background information
Birth name Taylor Josephine Stephanie Luciow[1]
Born (1990-08-27)August 27, 1990[2]
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Origin Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Died October 27, 2009(2009-10-27) (aged 19)
Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada
Genres Folk, Country
Occupation(s) Singer–songwriter
Instruments Vocals, Guitars
Years active 2006–2009
Labels Back Road Tavern Productions [3]
Website TaylorMitchell.ca

Taylor Mitchell (August 27, 1990 – October 27, 2009), was a Canadian country folk singer and songwriter from Toronto. Her debut and only album, For Your Consideration received encouraging reviews and airplay. Following a busy summer performance schedule, which included an appearance as a young performer at the Winnipeg Folk Festival, Mitchell embarked on a tour of Eastern Canada with a newly acquired license and car. She died at age 19 of blood loss after coyotes bit her while she was walking in Cape Breton Highlands National Park's Skyline Trail. Mitchell's death was the first recorded fatality from an attack on an adult. It shocked experts and led to a reassessment of the risk to humans from the predator behaviour of coyotes.

Career

Mitchell was born with the given name was Taylor Josephine Stephanie Luciow. She grew up in Toronto, Ontario. Taylor became interested in performing by her mid teens, and after graduating from the Etobicoke School of the Arts with a major in musical theatre, decided on a career as a singer and songwriter, taking Mitchell as a stage name. Mitchell had released a four track EP in 2007, she independently released an album titled For Your Consideration in March 2009.[4][5] In June 2009, she was invited to perform in the Winnipeg Folk Festival.[6][7][8] Reaction from the roots music community and radio stations was positive, and she began working on new material. A contributor to the album, Justin Rutledge, later described Mitchell as having written beyond her years: "She didn’t provide answers, as so many of her age try to do. There was no preciousness about her. Instead she asked questions."[9] To promote the album she went on a solo concert tour of the eastern coast Maritimes, beginning on October 23, 2009. A few days before her death, Mitchell was nominated for a Canadian Folk Music Award as Young Performer of the Year.[10] Her last performance was in Lucasville, near Halifax; there were two days before her scheduled concert in Sydney.[4][8][11]

Death

Coyote background

A three-year-old girl in Glendale, California named Kelly Keen was the only known American fatality due to a coyote attack. It occurred on August 26, 1981.[12] In their original south west range, coyotes were primarily hunters of rodents.[13] Coyotes expanded their range north and east, they arrived in eastern Canada in 1911. Eight years later, coyotes formed a hybrid with wolves at Algonquin Provincial Park known as "coywolf".[14] Coywolves were first proven to exist in Nova Scotia in 1977.[13] Some biologists believe that expansions may be associated with evolution of new traits.[15] In a study male coyotes averaged a weight of 34 pounds; there is a verified case of two coyotes killing a female moose weighing over 400 lb.[13][16] Widespread open seasons and bounties on coyotes led to them being avoidant, but in both Canadian and American national parks where hunting is forbidden, they could easily lose all fear of humans.[9] In 2003, a teenage girl walking on the Skyline Trail was bitten by a coywolf, her parents frightened it away.[17] There were also reports of coyotes watching and following park visitors.[8][15][18]

Fatal attack

Having some free time before her next concert, Mitchell, an environmentalist who enjoyed nature walks, went to Cape Breton Highlands National Park on the afternoon of October 27. At 2:45 a couple going in the opposite direction passed her near the beginning of the Skyline Trail. For an unknown reason, she doubled back after going a short distance along the trail and came back down the access road to the car park. It is possible a coywolf was stalking her at this stage.[8][18]

At 3:02, a hiking couple named Mike and Gayle, by this time on the access road to the car park, moved out of the way and photographed two coywolves that walked towards them along the road, going in the opposite direction. Trent University's Environmental and Life Sciences graduate program and a research scientist for the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources Brent Patterson later commented that the male hiker's photo showed two coywolves were having an extraordinary lack of fear, with one having what verged on a dominant attitude toward humans. It is believed these coyotes encountered the oncoming Mitchell on the access road a few minutes later, when the couple heard what they thought could be either animal noises or screams in the distance. They reported the noises by telephone at the car park.[8]

A group of four other hikers arrived in the carpark, where they heard about the possible screams in the distance from the couple. After several minutes' walk along the access road they began to find personal items of Mitchell's, including keys and a small knife (believed to have been used by her in an attempt to defend herself as she was forced back up the access road and onto the Skyline Trail). As the hikers turned into the clearing at the head of the trail, they saw torn pieces of bloodied clothing and a large amount of blood along the ground. A washroom in the clearing had blood on the door. At 3:25 they found Mitchell lying nearby among trees, with a coywolf standing over her. It was only after repeated charges by the three young men that the coywolf could be made to move away from her. She was conscious and able to speak with the rescuers. The coywolf remained close by, growling and unafraid until a shotgun was fired at it by a Royal Canadian Mounted Police officer who had arrived.[19][20] Mitchell had been bitten over most of her body, with particularly serious wounds to her leg and head. She was taken to Sacred Heart Community Health Centre in Chéticamp, and then airlifted to Queen Elizabeth II Health Sciences Centre in critical condition from the extreme blood loss she had suffered, but did not recover from the attack. Her mother was at her side after midnight.[1][8] Her interment was at Greenwood Cemetery in Owen Sound, Ontario.[21]

Aftermath

There was speculation by wildlife experts that Mitchell might have initiated contact by trying to feed coyotes or by disturbing a den with young.[8] Various other proposed explanations were the coyotes might have been wolf crosses, rabid, immature, starving or protecting a carcass.[8] None of these suggestions were subsequently borne out, causing a reassessment of potential risk to humans from coyote attacks. It was also thought by experts that Mitchell may have provoked a predation behaviour by running away, though a coywolf may have been behind her when she was confronted by the oncoming ones.[8][20][22][23]

As is standard practice when an animal remains at large after killing a human, wardens searched for the attacker animal in the vicinity, where five or six coywolves were believed to live.[8] Mitchell's mother issued a statement saying that her daughter would not have wanted her death to result in the extermination of the coyotes.[24]

Hours after the incident, while the trail was closed to the public, a female coywolf that acted aggressively was killed by a warden keeping watch at the washhouse location. Three other animals were killed within a kilometer of the Skyline trail after being caught in leg-hold traps before a large (42 lb) male was similarly dispatched five kilometres away on November 14. Scientific investigation of the carcasses determined that three, including the first and last accounted for, were linked to the attack on Mitchell by her blood on their coats and other forensic evidence. The large male coywolf was found to have been both the dominant lead coywolf photographed on the access road and the one found standing over Mitchell; coat markings in the photographs identified its carcass, which also contained pellets from the shotgun of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police officer who fired while at the scene. The dead coywolves not linked to the attack may have been pack-mates of the attackers.[8] The large male and the female may have been a breeding pair, both were related to the other attack-implicated coywolf.[18][19][20][22][23]

In mid November, a coywolf came up behind a couple walking in Cape Breton's national park approaching so closely that the man hit it on the head with a walking stick.[18] Park conservation managers and scientists opposed a general cull on the grounds that coywolves have the ability to reproduce quickly, and culling would be likely to have no impact, or the opposite of the desired effect. This reasoning assumes that animals removed from the local gene pool by a cull would have the same propensity to fear humans as those coywolves that avoided being caught and killed.[25][26] [27] In April, Nova Scotia declared a $20 bounty on coyotes, but this did not apply within Cape Breton's national park.[28] Visitors were asked to report encounters with coywolves. Ten months after Mitchell died, a 16-year-old girl camping with her parents in one of the park's campground, was bitten twice on the head by a coywolf.[29] A scientific study found that though usually unseen, coywolves were often in proximity to humans. Individual coywolves that are not conditioned by nonlethal aversion measures and fail to avoid humans are killed.[30][31][32]

Taylor Mitchell Legacy Trust

As a memorial, Mitchell's mother established the Taylor Mitchell Legacy Trust, which has a partnership with the David Suzuki Foundation. The trust promotes community outreach for musical/creative expression as well as educating on habitat preservation, the balance between human and wildlife interaction in both natural and urban settings, as well as safety precautions.[33]

For Your Consideration

For Your Consideration
Studio album by Taylor Mitchell
Released March 2009
Genre Folk, folk rock
Length 40:40
Label self-released

Mitchell's only album For Your Consideration was released in March 2009. Guest musicians on the album included Justin Rutledge, Lynn Miles, Suzie Vinnick, John Dinsmore, and Michael Johnston.[34] The album received a positive review from Exclaim!, with Eric Thom describing her as "definitively old school, if not world-weary", while Now Toronto describing it as sounding "like it comes from someone of a completely different generation".[5][34]

Track listing

  1. "Don't Know How I Got Here" – 4:08
  2. "For Your Consideration" – 3:13
  3. "Clarity" – 4:18
  4. "Ride Into the Sunset" – 4:14
  5. "Fun While It Lasted" – 3:41
  6. "Diamonds & Rust" (Joan Baez)– 4:06
  7. "Trick of the Light" – 5:00
  8. "Secluded Roads" – 3:51
  9. "Shelter from the Storm" – 4:31
  10. "Love and Maple Syrup" – 3:18

See also

References

  1. 1 2 "Coyotes kill Toronto singer in Cape Breton". CBC.ca. 2009-10-28. Retrieved 2015-11-08.
  2. ↑ "CDbabay.com profile". Retrieved 2009-12-08.
  3. ↑ iTunes Store. "For Your Consideration". Retrieved 2009-12-08.
  4. 1 2 Aulakh, Raveena (2009-10-28). "Toronto singer killed by coyotes". The Star. Retrieved 2009-10-28.
  5. 1 2 Boles, Benjamin (March 17, 2009). "Disc Review: Taylor Mitchell - For Your Consideration (Independent)". NOW Toronto. Retrieved 2009-10-29.
  6. ↑ "Coyotes kill Toronto singer". London Free Press. 2009-10-28. Retrieved 2009-10-28.
  7. ↑ "Toronto singer killed by coyotes". The Globe and Mail. 2009-10-28. Retrieved 2009-10-28.
  8. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 National Geographic Channel, Attack In The Wild: Coyote Mystery (documentary)
  9. 1 2 Explore Magazine, Feb 22, 2010, When coyotes attack retrieved 1/9/14
  10. ↑ "Cape Breton coyote attack kills touring folk singer". CTV.ca. 2009-10-28. Retrieved 2015-11-08.
  11. ↑ "Coyote attack silences emerging Toronto talent". CBC.ca. 2009-10-28. Retrieved 2015-11-08.
  12. ↑ A History of Urban Coyote Problems, Robert M. Tim & Rex O. Baker, University of Nebraska - Lincoln, 2007
  13. 1 2 3 Nova Scotia Canada (government)Frequently Asked Questions about Eastern Coyote in Nova Scotia retrieved 22/8/14
  14. ↑ http://www.capebretonpost.com/News/Local/2013-02-10/article-3174249/Documentary-says-coywolves-found-in-Cape-Breton/1
  15. 1 2 Royal Society Biology Letters,,23 September 2009, Rapid adaptive evolution of northeastern coyotes via hybridization with wolves
  16. ↑ CBC news, Oct 24, 2013, Coyotes are moose killers, study finds retrieved 24/8/14
  17. ↑ Cape Breton Post, October 29, 2009, Coyotes kill teen folk singer in Cape Breton park
  18. 1 2 3 4 Explore magazine, 22Feb 2010, When coyotes attack
  19. 1 2 Elizabeth Royte (2008-02-08). "Canis Soup". Live Bravely Outside. Retrieved 2013-05-15.
  20. 1 2 3 "Killed by Coyotes". Nat Geo Wild. 18 February 2011. Retrieved 3 January 2012.
  21. ↑ http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=43652143
  22. 1 2 "Coyote attacks on humans extremely rare: Experts". The Gazette. 2009-10-28. Retrieved 2009-10-28.
  23. 1 2 Alison Auld, Cape Breton News: Coyotes kill teen folk singer in Cape Breton park (local comments by local readers), last updated at 12:10 AM on 29/10/2009
  24. ↑ NYT, Nov1 2009, Mother of Canadian Singer Killed by Coyotes Asks That the Animals Be Spared
  25. ↑ Nature. May 16, 2012. Coyotes are the new top dogs
  26. ↑ Chronicle Herald, March 10, 2013 Coyotes, with some wolf on the side
  27. ↑ When coyotes attack
  28. ↑ Cape Breton Post Erin Pottie, August 11, 2010 Campers undeterred by coyote attack
  29. ↑ the star.com Canada, Parks Canada to launch study of aggressive Cape Breton coyotes
  30. ↑ the Star.com canada, Tue Aug 10 2010, Teenage girl attacked by coyote as she slept in Cape Breton
  31. ↑ CTV news, January 9, 2012, Study launched to reduce coyote encounters in C.B. park Retrieved 25/814
  32. ↑ CBC news, Jul 25, 2012, Study shows coyotes stay close to people
  33. ↑ Taylor Mitchell Home, retrieved 30/8 14
  34. 1 2 Thom, Eric (2009) "Taytlor Mitchell For Your Consideration", Exclaim!, June 2009. Retrieved August 2, 2013

External links

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