Endurance.Net Ridecamp Archives

> As wolves are and hunt as pack animals, they will look at an elk herd
> and can pick out the old/weak/sick elk to take, so I doubt they would
> take on a healthy horse with a human on it. Of course, I would not be
> able to explain that rationally to my horse.
Wolves do NOT selectively take out the old/weak/sick etc.  They kill for
the fun and joy of killing.  Game biologists in this area have found whole
groups of elk slain--prime of life cows, half-grown calves, etc.--one
group had 19 elk all slain at the same time with just their noses bitten
off.  Unlike most other predators who primarily kill to eat unless they
are rogue individuals, wolves CAN and routinely DO kill just for the sake
of killing.

I don't know about a horse with a rider on it, but given that we had a
confirmed wolf kill here a few years ago where a nearly-full-grown horse
was slain in a pole corral within several feet of the owner's house, and
given that we had a situation last year where a small pack tried to attack
a man and his wife and their saddle horses and pack mules (they were not
mounted at the time--the pack leader was shot in mid-air by the husband as
he leaped to attack the wife, who, knowing her husband was a good
marksman, had the guts to just drop to the ground to give him a clear
shot, and the killing of the pack leader broke up the attack), I wouldn't
trust that being mounted on a horse would be a deterrent to a wolf pack.

My biggest fear raising horses here in central Idaho is having a wolf pack
come in on a spree.

Heidi


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I still prefer what it is that BH100, Tevis, The Duck's Soup of Endurance,
etc. has to offer...but, to see a horse canter over sand for those
distances...Good Lord, it humbles me.
~  Frank Solano

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