Since my main task was to keep the coyotes away from the calves I was armed with a saddle rifle, my old short-barreled Winchester .30-30. When I was night herding I heard a lot of coyotes yipping and yowling but only saw coyotes twice. Once I spotted one loping towards the herd and I reined in, drew the Winchester from its scabbard and carefully led the beast. I could see it clearly in the strong moonlight. I fired and missed but I must have got close because without slowing down he veered away from the herd, zig-zagging as he ran. He must have been shot at before. I counted him as a "mission kill."
The other one I saw was very close in to the herd, crouching getting ready to spring. I was afraid to shoot at him because he was between me and the cattle and I sure didn't want to go down as having shot a cow if I missed him. So I charged him. I thought about yelling and whooping but I didn't want to startle the cattle. When he spotted me coming he took off. Once I was between him and the herd I chanced a shot at him. He was pretty far away by then, but I reined in my horse, took careful aim, gently squeezed the trigger while holding my breath and ... missed him clean. I swear he turned his head to look at me, though. I imagined him saying, "Nya, nya, ya missed me!"
I levered another round into the chamber and lined up on him again, but didn't fire. If I didn't hit him the first time I sure wasn't going to now that he was farther away and getting hard to make out.
Once in a while, I heard a shot fired by one of the cowpokes and wondered it they had any better luck than me.
Other than those two incidents nothing happened other than I got really cold. The sky was mostly clear so the temperature plunged down into the single digits. Before the moon rose the night sky was stunning. So many stars. The Milky Way a wonder of creation. To fight the cold, sometimes I leaned forward on my mount, hugging her neck to absorb some of her warmth. Several times I dismounted to swing my arms and stamp my feet to get the circulation going. I walked some, too, did jumping jacks and squats and so forth, then remounted. I had to keep up with the herd and keep an eye out for those darn coyotes. I remembered the words a worn out old man had once spoken to me, that the best job was one with no heavy lifting, indoors in winter and all the water you could drink. I thought it was a joke then, but now I understood.
After sunrise we brought dogs out, mostly border collies but also a couple of blue heelers, a type of dog I don't like but they were very good at encouraging the stragglers to keep up. We didn't have dogs out at night because they might have been mistaken for coyotes and shot, but during the day they were very aggressive toward any coyote that showed up. I saw one border collie actually overtake a running coyote and bite one of his rear legs, causing him to tumble. He got up and lunged at the border collie. The collie didn't engage but darted away. I took the opportunity to risk a shot at the coyote. Missed again, but I saw dirt and snow scatter just behind him. I should have led him a little more and maybe aimed a bit higher but he took off like a scalded cat so I counted it another mission kill. At the shot, the collie, who was charging in again on the coyote, veered off and ran back to the herd.
Once the herd was at the new pasture the coyotes became less of a problem. Maybe they stuck to their home range. I don't know. We did lose a few calves despite all our efforts so maybe they had eaten their fill and didn't feel the need to risk getting shot.
The sun was warm and the days were quite pleasant. We all took turns sleeping in the camper mounted in the bed of a 4x4 pickup and chowing down at another that had been converted to a modern-day chuckwagon. Some boys drove up with hay bales that we broke open and scattered over the snow for the cattle to feed on.
After a few days of this, a relief crew took over. I was glad to head out, bone weary and sore. We rode our horses to the old bunkhouse and stable where the hands were staying and after taking care of our mounts and having a supper of pinto beans cooked with dried chili peppers, fried eggs, ham, bacon and fresh-baked corn bread sopped in bacon grease, a salad of tomatoes, lettuce, onions, carrots, green peppers and black olives with a dressing made of vinegar, olive oil and lemon juice, and a desert of bread pudding with raisins, washed down with percolator coffee, all rustled up by yours truly, the guys washed up and crawled into their bunks. I cleaned the dishes, noting there were no left overs, not even one piece of corn bread. One of the guys got out of his rack and dried and put away the dishes for me. Afterwards, I sat down in a chair by the old coal-burning pot-bellied stove. Oh, it was so toasty warm there. I closed my eyes and fell asleep. When I woke up about 45 minutes later everybody was sleeping. I packed up my gear, left a note saying good-bye and God bless and went home.
The cowpokes weren't so lucky. They are still out there, earning their pay.
Later, I thought about the conversation I had with the 'poke who dried the dishes for me. I mentioned my chagrin at firing at and missing three coyotes and he said, "You didn't really want to kill those coyotes, did you?" As soon as he said that, I realized it was true, although it had never entered my conscious mind before. I stopped washing, pot in hand, as I thought about that. He looked at me, understanding. Then he said, "You know we lost calves to coyotes. Maybe to those you didn't shoot. Think about the horror of those calves being attacked and ripped apart by the 'yotes, their moms trying to fend them off and failing, how they feel because you felt sympathy for their killers. Something always has to die, Wanda. Something always does. Us or them."
