They wait until some one gets separated--a young calf, or, perhaps, a decrepit old bull--which they fall upon and worry to pieces.

They follow all parties of hunters and travellers--taking possession of a camp-ground, the moment its occupants have moved out, and devouring every scrap of eatables that may have been left behind.

They will, even, sometimes steal into the camp by night, and appropriate the very morsel which the hunter had designed for his breakfast in the morning.

This sometimes leads to a spirit of retaliation; and the indignant hunter, growing less provident of his powder and lead, cracks away until he has laid several of them stretched along the grass.
They are more numerous than any other species of American wolves; and on this account--having so many mouths to feed, and so many stomachs to satisfy--they often suffer from extreme hunger.

Then, but not till then, they will eat fruits, roots, and vegetables--in short, anything that may sustain life.
These wolves take their trivial name from their being met with principally on the great prairies of the west--although other species of American wolves are found in the prairie country as well as they.