Instead of being one of the most common they have become one of the rarest sights of the plains.

A hunter may wander far and wide through the plains for months nowadays and never see a wolf, though he will probably see many coyotes.

However, the diminution goes on, not steadily but by fits and starts, and moreover, the beasts now and then change their abodes, and appear in numbers in places where they have been scarce for a long period.

In the present winter of 1892-'93 big wolves are more plentiful in the neighborhood of my ranch than they have been for ten years, and have worked some havoc among the cattle and young horses.

The cowboys have been carrying on the usual vindictive campaign against them; a number have been poisoned, and a number of others have fallen victims to their greediness, the cowboys surprising them when gorged to repletion on the carcass of a colt or calf, and, in consequence, unable to run, so that they are easily ridden down, roped, and then dragged to death.
Yet even the slaughter wrought by man in certain localities does not seem adequate to explain the scarcity or extinction of wolves, throughout the country at large.