The Sheep Herders Who Burned a Half-Million Dollars to Scare Coyotes
For eighteen months a Rattlesnake Hills gas well blazed away at a herders' camp — until experts did the math and a three-cornered oil race began.
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As a rule sheep herders are not given to reveling in luxuries or indulging in riotous living, but up in the Rattlesnake hills there was a time when the sheep herders not only cooked their frugal meals of bacon and beans over a natural gas flame, but in a year and a half they consumed nearly a half a million dollars' worth of perfectly good gas in frightening the coyotes away from their flocks.
Some time after gas was struck in the well on the Conservative Land company's holdings, sheep herders lighted the gas and it was not turned off until 18 months later when the well was capped. Had the sheep owners been called upon to pay for the gas consumed by their herders at regular commercial rates, their light and fuel bill would have been the neat little sum of $26,841.66 a month, or $488,260 for the 18 months.
These figures are based upon the estimates of W. B. Linn, of the Illinois gas and oil fields, who visited the gas well last Sunday. Mr. Linn estimates that the present gas flow of the well at usual commercial rates would be worth $760 a day, and is sufficient to supply a good-sized town.
In the party with Mr. Linn were several Kennewick business men and W. T. Tyler, superintendent of the division of the Northern Pacific. Mr. Tyler, who was generally in charge of the division and familiar with the fields, like Mr. Linn, expressed great surprise at the strong flow of the well. Not only were they favorably impressed with the prospects for oil and gas in the field, but were at a loss to account for the apparent indifference of men who for three years have known of the existence of the gasser.
After visiting the gas well the party stopped at the Yakima Natural Gas & Oil company's well No. 1, where drilling operations are progressing most satisfactorily. The drill is now down around the 600-foot level and working in a formation that is very encouraging. The log of the new well is almost identical with that of the gasser in which gas was struck at a depth of 692 feet.
It became definitely known this week that H. J. Snively, of North Yakima, and associates, who have large holdings in the district, have matured plans for sinking a well on their lands. They have contracted with an experienced Pennsylvania driller, who will bring one of his largest outfits from the east. This well is to be sunk under the direction of State Geologist Harry Landes, who has been making the closest study of the field; Mr. Snively has written that Prof. Landes will visit the field again soon and requests that a delegation of Kennewick business men meet him at the well.
With the decision of the Snively interests to drill, the race for oil becomes a three-cornered one between them, the Herbert C. Harris Co. of California and the Yakima N. G. & O. company as the other contestants. It is known, too, that unknown interests are quietly at work getting leases with a view to early drilling operations.
“In a year and a half they consumed nearly a half a million dollars' worth of perfectly good gas in frightening the coyotes away from their flocks.”
The herders' bonfire of wasted gas is a parable of resource booms: wealth nobody had yet valued, literally going up in flame to keep the coyotes off. A century later the debate over who profits from the land's resources — and how much is squandered — still defines the region. It also shows how quickly a frontier story becomes a leasing frenzy once a few men with money notice.
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