The Battle of the Bluffs
A pack of greyhounds brings a swift, bloody end to a local coyote, turning the riverbanks into a scene of primal, rural drama.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Matt M. Weihl, king of the dwellers on the flats over the Columbia from White Bluffs, reports an exciting battle near his place this week between J. C. Locke's two greyhounds and a coyote. The dogs took the scent in the sagebrush and caught up with the fleeing coyote halfway up the bluffs. One dog made a detour and intercepted the beast, turning him down the hill. At the foot of the bluff, both hounds attacked the coyote, crunching the bones and literally tearing him to pieces. The battle was witnessed by the flat dwellers.
“At the foot of the bluff both hounds attacked the coyote, crunching the bones and literally tearing him to pieces.”
While wildlife encounters remain a part of life in the arid shrub-steppe of the Columbia Basin, the open-range brawls of pioneer dogs have largely vanished in an era of suburbanization and controlled wildlife management. The brutal efficiency of the frontier described here reflects a time when predatory wildlife posed a direct threat to the fragile agricultural livelihoods of the valley.
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