STA313 Data Visualization·Toronto Animal Services 311

Wild TO

Tens of thousands of calls. One year. Every ward.

August Zheng, Aiwei Yin, Dongyue Xu, Cathy Zhou, Zihan Zhao, Xinyi Li
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Field Notes

What the data tells us

Seasonal swing
4.8×

From September's peak of 1,301 weekly requests to January's low of 271, Toronto's animal calls nearly quintuple with the seasons. The city's relationship with wildlife is anything but constant.

Peak week1,301Sep 15, 2025
Quietest week271Jan 26, 2026

Every summer,
wildlife takes over.

In the warmer months, injured raccoons, nesting birds, and orphaned squirrels flood Toronto's 311 line. By September, 3 out of 4 calls are about wild animals.

In winter, that share drops to just over half — and call volumes collapse entirely.

Summer
72.6%
Spring
67.8%
Fall
71.4%
Winter
56.8%
Share of calls that are wildlife

Half of all coyote sightings happen
in just 5 neighbourhoods.

Downtown coyotes are real. Spadina–Fort York ranks #2 despite being one of the most urban wards in the city.

Etobicoke Centre
67
Spadina–Fort York
57
Scarborough SW
27
York Centre
20
Parkdale–High Park
19

379 total coyote reports · Top 5 = 50% of all sightings

Same city. Different worlds.

Toronto Centre is the only ward where wildlife drops below 50% of calls.

Etobicoke-LakeshoreLakefront
78.7% wildlife
Where the wild things are. Nearly 4 in 5 calls are about wildlife.
Toronto CentreDowntown
49.6% wildlife
It's complicated. Safety, compliance, and strays dominate the other half.

Summer reshuffles
the leaderboard.

Etobicoke-Lakeshore
3.7×summer to winter
Don Valley West
3.4×summer to winter
Toronto Centre
1.7×summer to winter
Etobicoke North
1.6×summer to winter

Some neighbourhoods almost shut down in winter. Others barely notice the seasons change at all.