Live coyote pulled from Chicago Aldi refrigerator

    CHICAGO (WBBM) -- A video posted to social media Monday morning caught the moment a coyote was pulled out from a grocery store refrigerator on the West Side.

It all went down at the Aldi store at 800 N. Kedzie Ave. in the Humboldt Park neighborhood. Police were called to the store at 9:42 a.m.

The wild, and mayhap wily, coyote had run into the supermarket and made a mad dash to the produce section. Chicago Police officers were first to the scene, where they cornered the animal hiding behind the items on a refrigerated shelf.

Customers could be heard gasping as officers made several attempts to yank the coyote out of the shelf—finally pulling the animal out by its tail.

The animal then ran back to the fridge. Patrons were left stunned by it all.

Chicago Animal Car and Control was also notified with multiple calls. It took time for their officers to arrive.

Budget cuts and staff shortages within Animal Care and Control, an issue on which CBS News Chicago has reported, have left the agency leaning heavily on the CPD.

Responding animal control officers did eventually take the coyote into custody.

Liza Lehrer saw the video on social media, and called its climactic moment "quite a surprise." Btu since Lehrer is the assistant director of the Urban Wildlife Institute at Lincoln Park Zoo, she said it was not a total surprise.

"The colder temperatures—we don't see human activity really as much, you know, out in our parks and in our natural areas," Lehrer said, "and so that's kind of the time where a lot of different wildlife might be a little bit more active—during the daytime, unexpectedly."

A spokesperson for Chicago Animal Care and Control said the coyote captured Monday to be transferred to Flint Creek Wildlife Rehabilitation. Though the animal appeared uninjured, Flint Creek will perform an assessment before releasing it back into the wild if appropriate.

No injuries to people were reported during the chain of events Monday.

Coyote sightings are commonplace in Chicago

This was not the first time a coyote went into a Chicago food establishment. On April 3, 2007, the coyote crept into a Quiznos sub shop at 37 E. Adams St. in the Loop during peak lunchtime.

Crews from what was then called CBS 2 News were on the scene as Animal Care and Control loaded the coyote into a van.

"I jumped on top of the counter. I was a little scared," Quiznos employee Ronneshia Mukes told Dana Kozlov at the time. "I didn't know what it was, though, until I came from over the counter, and it was a coyote."

That coyote was released into the wild the next day.

In January 2020, a coyote was captured in Lincoln Park a day after biting a 6-year-old boy on the head near the Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum. In the weeks prior, there had been numerous coyote sightings and attacks on two dogs—one in the Cabrini Rowhouses, the other in Old Town.

In 2023, a total of 1,073 coyote complaints were made to Chicago Animal Care and Control. In 2024, there were 1,358.

"These animals are doing everything they can to stay away from us," said Chris Anchor of the Forest Preserve District of Cook County.

Anchor said the coyote found in the Aldi on Monday did not want food. The animal was probably walking down the sidewalk and trying to avoid people when the door opened, he said.

For the next three months, coyotes are focused on finding a mate during breeding season—which runs from January through March, Anchor said.

"Right now, they're very active in setting up territories and defending them," he said.

An Animal Care and Control spokesperson said with coyotes in their mating season, people in the Chicago area should keep their pets on a leash. People should also secure food sources to minimize coyote encounters, and should never feed coyotes, Animal Care and Control said.

Anyone who does run across a coyote should make themselves big and yell, and should not run.