106 AN AMERICAN HUNTER 



rescue, and the coyote first attacked them and then sud- 

 denly sprang aside and again worried the bedding, by 

 which time one of them was able to get in a shot and 

 killed it. All coyotes, like big wolves, die silently and 

 fight to the last. I had never weighed any coyotes until 

 on this trip. I weighed the twelve which I myself saw 

 caught, and they ran as follows: male, thirty pounds; 

 female, twenty-eight pounds; female, thirty-six pounds; 

 male, thirty-two pounds; male, thirty-four pounds; fe- 

 male, thirty pounds; female, twenty-seven pounds; male, 

 thirty-two pounds; male, twenty-nine pounds; young 

 male, twenty-two pounds ; male, twenty-nine pounds ; fe- 

 male, twenty-seven pounds. Disregarding the young 

 male, this makes an average of just over thirty pounds. 1 

 Except the heaviest female, they were all gaunt and in 

 splendid running trim; but then I do not remember ever 

 seeing a really fat coyote. 



The morning of the first day of our hunt dawned 

 bright and beautiful, the air just cool enough to be pleas- 

 ant. Immediately after breakfast we jogged off on horse- 

 back, Tom Burnett and Bony Moore in front, with six or 

 eight greyhounds slouching alongside, while Burke Bur- 

 nett and " War Bonnet " drove behind us in the buggy. 

 I was mounted on one of Tom Burnett's favorites, a beau- 

 tiful Kiowa pony. The chuck wagon, together with the 



1 I sent the skins and skulls to Dr. Hart Merriam, the head of the Bio- 

 logical Survey. He wrote me about them : "All but one are the plains coyote, 

 Canis nebracenris. They are not perfectly typical, but are near enough for all 

 practical purposes. The exception is a yearling pup of a much larger species. 

 Whether this is fr us tor I dare not say in the present state of knowledge of the 

 group." 



