THE SHADOW OF THE DESERT 81 



rancher who might overlook the smaller trespass 

 of Reynard. Yet his presence seems needed upon 

 the desert, for though a killer of poultry and 

 lambs, and even of young calves, he is no such 

 plague to the farmer as is the jack rabbit, whose 

 only natural check, besides disease, he seems to 

 be. The coyotes, a few years ago, were numerous 

 about the town of Burns. We had gone thirty 

 miles into the desert before seeing this one at 

 Silver Lake. Left without their natural enemy, 

 not only the jacks, but the little ground squirrels, 

 or picket-pins, also, have so multiplied on the 

 farms about the town as to become a plague. 

 These squirrels are to be seen in the roads by 

 half-dozens; and I inspected one alfalfa meadow 

 that was literally honeycombed with their tunnels, 

 the crop so badly cut into that the damage could 

 be seen at a glance. The farmer can more easily 

 protect himself against the coyote than against 

 the rabbit and the picket-pin. 



This does not settle the problem of the coyote ; 

 and he is only one item in the very complicated 

 and very serious problem of the unbalanced state 

 of things everywhere in nature due to our taking 

 over the affairs outdoors. That the sportsmen 



