Memories of Old Montana

by Con Price

The wolf is a better killer than the coyote but not near so smart.

One morning on a roundup, we left camp just at daylight and we had gone about four miles and was riding at a gallop when we came over a little hill. We rode right into a bunch of wolves. They had killed a big fat cow and was eating on her. They evidently had been eating for some time, as there wasn’t much of her left. They were so full of meat they couldn’t hardly run at all. There were about thirty of us and not many had guns that morning—but everybody had ropes and we sure went to making loops. Of course, they scattered every direction and every cowboy was trying to catch a wolf, as the bounty that time was $5.00 a head. It was sure an exciting morning. Some of those cowboys’ horses wouldn’t go near a wolf and when they got a smell of them would snort and run the other way. Sometimes when a cowboy did catch one and took his wraps on the saddle horn, the horse would stampede, wolf and all. Sometimes when they would throw at one, he would snap at the loop and if he hit it, would cut it in two like a razor would.

It was a strange thing to me—but I was riding a young horse that morning that had not been broke long, but he cocked his ears forward and took right after them wolves. I believe he thought he was chasing a colt. I got two wolves and choked and dragged them until they were dead. One had been shot through the shoulder by the boss, so he was easy to catch. I met the boss coming over a little hill. He was sure smoking this one up with his six-shooter, and as I had killed mine, he hollered, “Get this one, Con. I saw a black one back here. I want to get him.” (The others were all gray wolves.) He had lost his hat and he had been chasing those wolves so hard his pants legs was up to his knees and he sure looked wild. He didn’t get back to camp until night—but he didn’t get the black wolf.

We got nine wolves out of the bunch—I don’t know how many got away—but we didn’t have any roundup or gather any cattle that day, as the cowboys kept stringing in all day, one and two at a time.

I have tried several times since that time to rope a wolf but always found them too fast for me when they were empty. Those wolves were a great menace to the stockmen. One couldn’t poison them, as when they got hungry they killed whatever animal they wanted, and they were sure plentiful.

I have seen places on Milk River when it had froze up and fresh snow had fell on the ice, it looked like a bunch of school boys had been playing where there had been a bunch of wolves.

They weighed about one hundred pounds and measured almost seven to eight feet long. Their first move to make a kill was to ham-string the animal by grabbing the animal by the fleshy part of the hind leg. That usually brought the animal to the ground and then, of course, they made short work of the job.

I broke a bunch of horses one time for a man by the name of Gordon near Ubet in the Judith Basin. He told me when I started he would give me sixty dollars for one month’s work—that was all he would pay out on them. He didn’t want them roped, but must catch them in a chute. Above anything else, he didn’t want them to buck, and as there was twelve head of them, it was impossible to do much of a job on them in that length of time.

I got along fairly well with them for awhile. I think I had rode about five head. I was out on the range riding one of them one day and saw a big wolf. This colt was pretty fast. So I thought I would give the wolf a little run. When I got close to him, I seen he was crippled, evidently had been in a fight with another wolf, so I roped him. Now when I started dragging that wolf, the horse went plumb crazy. He whistled, snorted, kicked and bucked and run away, but I still had the wolf and dragged him to the ranch. Of course, the wolf was dead. When I got there—well, that horse never got over that scare. He jumped in the manger, kicked the side out of the barn, and whistled and snorted like a lion and got worse from day to day.

The old man wasn’t there the day I brought the wolf in, but did come out in a few days to see how I was getting along with the horses. When he went in the barn, this horse started kicking and snorting, bumped his head against the walls and run the old man out of the barn—and to make matters worse, he was his favorite colt. He asked me what was the matter with him. I told him I didn’t know—but I didn’t tell him about the wolf. Then another day he saw one buck with me—that did settle it. He said I was spoiling his horses instead of breaking them. Anyway, I stayed the month out and I think him and I were both glad when it was over and I was on my way.