My husband & I were both working in our yard, with our cat very near by, at what we considered a very safe time of day - only 6 pm, when a raven flew low overhead thru the trees, making quite the racket. I turned, and a large coyote was not 20 ft from me. He paused, looking at me, then I roared at him, and he left. We are both very concerned about this - this is not usual behaviour for these predators to be in town at this time of day! We live in town, with houses all around us, with pets and small children in our neighbourhood. I don't mind the bears, but I don't like coyotes and their hunting partners - ravens!
Town: Rossland, BC
The raven was warning you, and every other creature around.
Robins also make a racket when predators are nearby.
It's more common than you think. My best backyard coyote photos are in the late morning and early evening. They are very stealth hunters that mainly hunt the wild rabbits in my neighbourhood but lots of cats also go "missing".
A few years ago my wife and I were walking our chichuahua on leash on the street and I turned around to see a coyote following less than 4m behind us. I had to run towards it to scare it off, it wouldn't budge just by us seeing it and yelling. They're pretty bold animals.
Apparently we have had a coyote in our neighbourhood near the old hospital at various times of the day, and he/she has no fear whatsoever. We've been here many years, and have rarely seen them in this area. As for the ravens, all I've seen them show an interest in is garbage.
My neighbour has seen a coyote in her yard at 10:00 a.m. II thought we had an agreement with Coyote Nation about their hours of work and they're just straight up breaking the parameters of our contract!
But seriously, it is a problem for anyone with small animals.
I strongly disagree that the raven was warning us.
There is no biological drive for ravens to benevolently warn humans or small mammals of a coyotes approach. There is however a strong biological drive, ie food, for ravens to work with coyotes and other predators to alert them to the presence of prey and take advantage of the leftovers.
It sounds nice to think a raven would warn us but nature is a little harsher than that and our cat is just walking protein to the raven and the coyote.
@goldlion I don't think the raven was warning you humans, but may have been warning other ravens.