"I have noticed that Mr. Ernest Thompson Seton and others say a she wolf or dog staked out in the mating season is an infallible lure; and a captive wolf that will howl is good at any time.' We have a number of female wolves around the camp now and have had them for a long while, one is quite gentle and they howl. They have been staked out frequently with a circle of traps around each, but no wolf has been near.
"Aside from the sport to be obtained in trapping wolves, the pecuniary feature is of interest to the trappers. In New Mexico where they are much more plentiful than in Texas, there is a bounty of twenty dollars each on Lobo wolves (Canislupus) and two and one-half dollars on coyotes. Moreover the trapper does not have to wait for his money for the large ranch owners pay cash for the scalps in order to have him trap on their range, thus decreasing the number of wolves and thereby protecting their cattle and sheep. Too, the trapper is usually furnished a horse or two."
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.