MODERN SHEEP: BREEDS AND MANAGEMENT. 241 



WILD ANIMALS AND THEIR DESTRUCTION. 



Among the wild animals that prey upon sheep in this ter- 

 ritory are to be found bears, panthers or mountain lions, wolves, 

 sometimes called loafers or hobos (the latter being Spanish for 

 wolf), coyotes, bobcats, or lynx, foxes and eagles. The bears, liv- 

 ing mostly in the high mountains, are getting very scarce and do 

 not make a regular business of preying upon sheep, but occasion- 

 c^lly "run amuck" among some flock that happens to be in their 

 vicinity. Panthers, or mountain lions, are rapidly becoming ex- 

 tinct, as they are so easily hunted with dogs. They will run up 

 the first tree they come to when pursued by a dog; then the 

 hunter can follow up and shoot them as they sit in the tree. They 

 are very dangerous enemies of sheep, as they will often get into 

 a corral or a flock and kill from one to twenty head of sheep in a 

 single night. They are also very easily trapped or poisoned. 



Some parts of the territory are thickly infested with large, 

 gray wolves, but they tend more to prey upon cattle and burros 

 than upon sheep, though occasionally they will get into a flock of 

 sheep and do a great deal of damage. They are very hard to trap 

 or poison and are a great menace to the cattle industry in parts 

 of the territory. 



Coyotes are more or less plentiful in nearly all parts of the 

 territory, and they are probably the worst enemy the New Mexico 

 flock owner has to contend with. They are a very cowardly, skulk- 

 ing animal and generally do their -depredating under cover of 

 darkness, although they often catch a sheep or lamb out of one 

 end of a flock while the herder is at the other end or out of sight. 

 Most of their slaughtering is done at night among small bands of 

 sheep that have perchance got separated from the main band dur- 

 ing the day and are roaming the hills without a herder. When a 

 coyote or a pack of coyotes they most generally run in packs of 

 from two to five finds a band of sheep alone in the hills at night 

 he (or the pack) chases and kills till tired, taking nothing but the 

 blood, which they suck as they kill the sheep. They are very de- 

 structive to lambs that happen to be left out on the range on ac- 

 count of being too young to walk to the corral. 



The natural food of the coyote is the jack rabbit, and of late 

 years the rabbits have increased wonderfully in the territory, so, 

 of course, the coyotes are increasing in proportion, but plenty of 

 coyotes and plenty of rabbits are not nearly so dangerous to the 

 sheepman as a few coyotes and a few rabbits, as in the latter "case 

 the coyotes cannot get enough rabbits to eat, so they have ^ to 

 go to hunting sheep, while in the former case Mr. Coyote is living 

 fat on Mr. Jack Eabbit and does not feel so much like hunting for 

 sheep, where he is always afraid of meeting a dose of hot lead. 

 Coyotes are very easily poisoned when they are hungry and corre- 



