Natural History

It has nothing to do with politics.

It is also not the blue lacy dog (“state dog of Texas.”)

It’s this thing:

Source.

“It looks like a coyote.”

“Tests say it was some sort of coyote.”

My guess is that these animals are coyotes with mange.

However, they could be coyotes that are evolving sparse hair– perhaps with an infusion of Latin American hairless dog genes.

It is speculated that sparse hair and hairlessness evolved in domestic dogs in Latin America as a way of dealing with ectoparasites.

In Pre-Columbian Latin America, larger numbers of dogs existed in very high densities. Dogs were food and sacrificial animals for some civilizations. It is also very likely that ectoparasites were a major problem. Having sparse hair or hairlessness is one way to deal with these parasites. The bugs are more easily plucked from the bare skin than they are from thick coats. If you’ve ever had a tick in your hair, you know how much harder it is to get it out than it is to pluck it off your leg.

Coyotes do exist at very high densities in parts of Texas, so it is possible that this same sort of environmental pressure is resulting the evolution of the same adaptation.

Of course, hairlessness in domestic dogs was always encouraged through selective breeding. If a dog didn’t have hair, it would be more likely to mate before it got eaten or sacrificed.

I think these animals will prove to be “some sort of coyote.”

That’s my guess.