just interested in self-preservation. I was glad I was up on the rock as the stampede of sheep and coyotes came my way.
Then entering the wave of wool
and fur were two border collie sheep dogs. By the look in their eyes and their body language you could tell that they didn’t have a clue in the world what was going on, but they were going to get involved. Before it was over I had sheep, coyotes, and sheep dogs scat- tered from here to Thursday. It was a hell of a morning! When the possibility of being run
over had subsided, I walked over to claim my coyotes and check two sheep that were down. I hadn’t seen those sheep before I shot as they were in a small gully just out of sight of the rock pile from which I fired. One ewe was bleeding from the nose and gasping for air and was not moving. The other was lying in a small depression on her back and kicking wildly to shift her weight in order to right herself. Her right ear had been bitten off where the flesh met the wool and she obviously was in severe distress. I grew up on this ranch and when one lives with 12,000 sheep you get to know sheep real well. Both of these big ewes either were going to die or they would have to be dispatched. It was about that time that the
sheepherder rode up on his horse and as he got off he shook my hand and told me thanks. Together, we assessed the medical condition of the sheep and after looking at both ewes he walked over to his horse, pulled a Model 94 lever action Winchester 30-30 out of its scabbard and, out of necessity, shot both ewes. His name was Miguel and I had
known him for a long time. He was from Mexico and he worked herding
sheep until they went to their winter range in early October. I could tell that he was upset about losing the sheep, but I assured him that I would do all I could to slow down the killing. So that the sheep that he had just shot hadn’t died for nothing, I suggested that I use them for bait, as I had a plan. I walked over to his sheep wagon
with him and we had coffee while I ran my plan by him. It was simple. I would walk back to my truck and drive over and tie a rope around the hind legs of the two sheep and drag them away from where they died, to a spot on the two-track road that I had driven in on. Once on the road I would cut a hole in the ewes’ throats and let them bleed. Then I’d drive off so they bled out on the road. The two-track led past a place where I have camped many times. When there I would untie the sheep and open their stomachs and leave them. At first light I would be lying on the hill above them and any coyote that was eating on them would be long dead before the sun was above the horizon. Miguel agreed with the plan and after we had coffee, I was off. My truck was more than a mile
away now, but that was not much of a walk for me. As I walked onto the two-track road on which I had parked, I noticed something that stopped me in my tracks. There were footprints in the tire ruts, the tracks of a large canine. These tracks were not made by a sheep dog – no border collie I had ever seen made a track that huge. I estimated the track at three inches wide and about the same length. I had seen hikers in the area in years past, mostly girls who used a large dog as security, so I decided that someone had been hiking and camping on the mountain and had brought a large dog. Once back at the truck I returned
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to where I had left the sheep, tied them to the trailer hitch ball, and away we went. I had put a small cut in the throats of both sheep and they were bleeding freely as I drove off. It was just over a mile to where I would drop the sheep and a mile-long blood trail makes quite a scent plume. Once at the designated site I cut open the intestines of the two sheep and the bait was in place. I continued on to my campsite that was about three hundred yards from where my bait station was, and downwind. In those days we didn’t have the
type of tents we have today, like my four season North Face VE-25 tent that is constructed out of nylon and has all the bells and whistles. But what I had was the best that was available at the time, my Coleman 8x8 umbrella tent. It was a great tent, easy to set up, and was roomy because the support poles all were on the outside. After the tent was up I put inside it my sleeping bag, air mattress, and everything else I had brought with me. I set up my trusty Coleman stove and camp was set. My cooler was placed in the remains of an old snow drift from last winter, a drift that was refusing to go quietly into the
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