CHAPTER XX.
WITH THE COYOTES.
By Louis Wessel.
While the tourist speeds across the cheerless plains on his way westward, snugly seated in the upholstered berths of an overland limited, the objects of attraction over the landscape are so rare that he will find little desire to spend or waste, as he will say, much time in viewing the scenery; and instead, will settle down to a book or something or other less monotonous than that almost boundless stretch of country, through which he must pass, before he can expect to see the rugged peaks of the Rockies loom up about the distant horizon. Swiftly the limited is carrying him toward his destination, yet slowly very slowly the time passes for him, as hour after hour wears away without bringing a change of scene, until even the monotony of the situation begins to generate in him an interest for the surroundings.
He lends a closer scrutiny to the objects as they speed by. "Why is yonder bluff so lifeless and dreary?" he mused. "What fantastic forms are those near it?" They are but spurs of the famous "Bad Lands." "And this large field of bushes, what is it," he inquires. Some newly formed friend who is better acquainted with the nature of the Great Plains will inform him that this is but a patch of sage bush, an aridity loving plant, characteristic of this region. He will explain that yonder mounds are part of a prairie dog town, and the little marmot like forms, perched in their peculiar attitudes on the little round knolls, represent the inhabitants of this populous city. The traveler has oft heard of prairie dogs, and is surprised on a close acquaintance with them. They appear so different from what his mind has pictured them. He watches them scamper to their burrows, sit up for a moment on their haunches and dive out of sight.
His interest, however, is not completely aroused until he catches sight of a dog like form, half hidden among the sage bush. He watches it as it disinterestedly trots along with drooping head and tail, a picture of despair, most perfectly suited to its environments. Once it stops all alert, looks back over its shoulder, ears pointed and nose uplifted, and the train leaves it behind in all its loneliness. This is our first acquaintance of the coyote or prairie wolf. Coyotes are of several varieties, each differing from the rest through certain peculiarities in form, size or color, and each having a well defined geographical range. Collectively they range from the upper Mississippi Valley westward through the Great Plains and Rocky Mountains, southward to northern Mexico and northward into British Columbia and the Northwest Territories.
While the coyote is found in one or another of its forms, in greater or lesser numbers throughout this region, its most congenial home is among the Bad Lands and among the sandstone ridges, steep sided buttes and deep narrow coulees and canyons in the Colorado and upper Missouri Valleys, and it is here that its greatest numbers are found. Being thoroughly fitted to these surroundings it has been enabled to hold its own through the advent of civilization, while most of its larger co-inhabitants have been sadly reduced in numbers.
It is true that the combined actions of poisons, traps and high power rifles have done much to reduce the numbers of the coyote in some of its favorite haunts, yet, in other localities, its persistent numbers are deserving of considerable credit. They prove but the survival of the fittest.
Among the mountains the coyote is rarely found, though since the coming of the white man with his flocks they have multiplied considerably in several localities even to such an alarming degree that ranches have found it unprofitable to further attempt to raise sheep.
The coyote of the plains is considerably smaller than the wolf, being intermediate in size between the red fox and the grey wolf. It has the short body, bushy tail, rounded head and pointed nose of the fox and might easily be mistaken for one. Its general color is fulvous, grizzled with black and white hairs and lighter underneath a color remarkable for its ability to blend with the brown and grey, that the arid Plains are clothed in the greater part of the year.
Although well proportioned and being where food is usually plentiful, it rarely fattens up, and almost invariably presents a hungry, half fed appearance. Its food consists mainly of small rodents and birds, such as it can dig up from the ground, or waylay by cat-like maneuvers. Preferring to live on a diet of such animals as it is enabled to capture and kill, it resorts to many schemes and tricks to satisfy its desire for fresh meat. Field mice and gophers living in shallow burrows, fall an easy prey to its diggings. Prairie dogs and cotton tails are waylaid at their place of refuge, and grouse and small birds are pounced upon when they venture too near its place of ambush.
Not always, however, is the coyote enabled to capture its game by such easy means, and when it chooses to dine on jack rabbit, it finds it requires all the power of perseverance and endurance it is capable of mustering up to overtake that fleet creature. As it happens, it is often obliged after a long chase to give up its quarry for a humbler meal. Probably it then decides it is not worth while to hunt the jack alone today, for it knows that if it can persuade one of its comrades to join the chase, Mr. Jack is doomed. When hunting in pairs, they give chase in turns, each stopping to rest in turn, thereby having a double cinch on the poor jack rabbit which is compelled to run continually until exhausted.
In the winter when birds are scarce and the small mammals have hibernated or are huddled away under the snow and frozen ground, the coyote is often sorely pressed for food, and he is then forced to content himself with gnawing off an existence from the frozen carcass of a horse or cow that has died probably months before. His ingenuity of last summer is replaced by a stubborn perseverance, which keeps him traveling day and night in search of scraps of food.
In the spring after the young are born, the bitch is kept busy from morn till night trying to satisfy the hunger of her growling litter of pups, and in her frantic efforts to do so, scruples little on running down and killing a stray sheep or an unprotected calf or colt. When, however, this large prey fails and the smaller game proves insufficient, she is again forced to the humbler larder of some carcass she has discovered on one of her many haunts.
Coyotes are not adepts at burrowing, yet, some credit must be accorded them for work in this line. They often follow up mice and gophers for several feet under the sod, though it remains for the female to exhibit the powers of burrowing possessed by her tribe. In late winter in the southern part of her range, and in the early spring in the northern part, she selects a safe location, usually under a boulder or a ledge of rock, or on the face of a rounded point in a coulee or gulch, from where she may keep a sharp lookout, and sets to work to dig a home for her prospective family. Large quantities of dirt are deposited at the mouth of the burrow, yet this amount is remarkably small when compared with the tunnel from which it is removed, which is often twenty feet or more in length and wide enough to admit a boy, or even in some cases a medium sized man.
At the end of the burrow, which is usually elevated, is an enlargement, in which a litter of from three to eight are brought forth. These are blind and helpless, yet after the first day of their earthly career it seems to become necessary that they exercise both their lungs and limbs, and except for the time that is spent in actual sleep, they keep up a persistent scrambling, one over another, and at the same time a constant growling and whining. The cries of the young and the shuffling about of awkward feet can often be distinctly heard at the mouth of the burrow. This is one of the tests the "wolfer" relies on when he has made the find of a burrow with fresh signs.
As soon as the little ones' eyes are open and their legs grow stronger, they begin to travel, first up and down the burrow, a little further each time, until the mouth is reached. Later on, during the warm sunny days they may be seen playing on the hillside near their home like so many kittens. Before they are half grown the fond mother leads her family out for its initial trip, usually to the nearest watering place, to which they subsequently make regular trips.
It is a pleasing sight to see the young coyotes in playful antics jump up the mother's side and play with her tail as they follow her or chase each other around the bushes. As soon as the young are old enough they are taken out and taught the rules and regulations of the hunt, and long before they are full grown they take an active part in the chase.
In late summer the young leave the maternal home in exchange for an independent life, and it may truly be said that the coyote's childhood day's are over, and it must face the stern realities of life with all its serious consequences. It now prefers to live the life of a hermit, with an occasional short interview with its neighbors.
Contrary to the habits of its cousin and neighbor, the wolf, the coyote is not often seen except singly or in pairs, though it is probable that they are more in the habit of congregating during the night, when the eyes of the hunter and his dogs are closed in sleep, and they are at liberty to roam at will. Their stealthy maneuvers are not apt to disclose their presence, and one usually is not aware of the fact that coyotes are near until he is suddenly reminded of it by one of those unearthly screeching, yelping utterances given vent to by the coyote during the long still night. Immediately the call is taken up by some prowler in a different direction, and in turn is repeated by others further away, until the air fairly resounds with that weird cry. Whether uttered in pleasure or in pain, it is one of nature's most unpleasant calls, and embodies all the hopelessness and despair so apparent on the wide plains of the west.
It is hard to describe the cry of the coyote, though a fair idea may be had by imagining a series of sharp, harsh yelps, terminating into a long drawn painfully entreating howl. Often repeated and echoed by several further away, half a dozen are able to produce enough noise to lead a stranger to believe that he is in the midst of a hundred blood thirsty demons who are proclaiming vengeance on any one that might lack of proper protection.
The coyote is detrimental to but a small degree except to the sheep industry. It is true that coyotes, when hard pressed by hunger, have been known to rob the ranches of its poultry or even to kill a calf or colt, but it is on the defenseless sheep and lambs that they commit their greatest ravages.
In some of the western states, where stock raising is an important industry, large bounties have been paid at different times for the destruction of the coyotes, and these bounties, together with those offered by stock associations and private parties, have induced a number of men and sometimes women, too, to make a business of the extermination of the coyote. Where formerly little time or trouble was spared to destroy these pests, now everybody who has an opportunity eagerly sets traps or poisonous baits for them, shoots at them at long range, runs them down with his bronco to ensnare them in the fatal noose of his lariat, or digs them and their families out of the depths of their underground retreat. The result is obvious. But few localities remain where coyotes hold their own in their original numbers.
The coyote is a wary animal and hard to approach within reasonable pistol shot range, and then only an experienced eye can draw a bead through the gun sights on its dull coat against the usual background of brown or grey. They are fleet foot creatures, and anything short of a greyhound, they are apt to leave behind struggling in the dust. Grey hounds and fox hounds are sometimes employed to run them down, and if one is caught out on the open plain by a pack of these hounds it is quickly dispatched. Frightened almost out of his wits, it repeatedly takes a quick glance back over its shoulder at the furious mob pursuing it, only to find that they are each time a little nearer, until it feels the sharp clasp of the jaws of the leader in deathly embrace. What sport this would be to some of our noblemen across the sea.
Like the red fox, the coyote will sometimes form the friendship of the farmer's dog, and once arrived at a mutual understanding amicable relationship is not easily broken.
As has been said, the coyote is swift afoot, but its wind is easily exhausted, and many a one has fallen a prey, through this lack, to the lariat of the hardy cowboy, who desires nothing more exciting for recreation than a rough and tumble chase through a prairie dog town in pursuit of one of these nimble creatures. Imagine the roughly clad westerner with hair and kerchief flying in the breeze, and the magic noose swinging round and round over his head, whooping at the top of his voice and urging his steed on to its best. Imagine him shooting forth that magic noose and see it settle over the coyote's head. A jerk of the hand tightens the rope, and a turn in the horse's course takes the coyote off his feet and drags him along bouncing from mound to mound into insensibility.
Coyotes cannot be said to possess a vicious nature. Armed with a short club, one may safely enter their burrows, and when trapped the same weapon will complete the work, as they are cowardly and rarely show fight.
Though possessing considerable cunning, coyotes are easier trapped than foxes, though they are slow at taking bait. Large numbers, however, are annually poisoned by placing strychnine in the carcasses of animals that have fallen, through old age or otherwise, of which the pangs of hunger are apt to force coyotes to make a meal. The action of strychnine is exceedingly fast, and it is no unusual occurrence to find a dead coyote a few feet from where it had been enjoying a dinner of poisoned meat.
Of all methods resorted to, however, none is highly responsible for the reduction of the coyote as that of digging up the young (and this often gives up the mother too) from the burrows. By one who is versed in coyote habits, the burrows are easily found, and the work of an hour or two with pick and shovel usually forces them to give up their treasures.
Not always, however, are the results so easily and quickly arrived at. The writer well remembers the first litter of pups he was fortunate enough to capture. After a three days' search among the deep coulees, along the upper Missouri, a den was located. But where? In the crevice of a ledge of sand rock. By placing my ear to the mouth of the burrow, I could hear the pups whining. The burrow was too small to admit me, and as it was too late in the day to commence operations, I plugged up the opening lest the bitch should proceed to transfer her young to some other place of refuge during the night. The greater part of the next day a friend and myself spent in enlarging the burrow with sledge and crowbar, and it was not until late in the afternoon that I was able to crawl in far enough and with the aid of a short stick with some nails drawn through the end, to rake out the six young, one by one.