Tatanka

Tatanka

  By

   Mike Capron

I understand that Tatanka is an Indian name for Buffalo. My experience with Tatanka is limited to one time I encountered a lone buffalo on a ranch that had a herd. We were gathering cattle to ship in the fall and I was not aware of  buffalo in the pasture. It was a large ranch and the buffalo roamed where they pleased. I came around a large black brush to find a lone buffalo standing there. My horse had no experience with buffalo either, and he was startled to the point  that I barely stayed with him through his booger.   This was my first encounter with buffalo and I thought buffalo were just like cattle and would react just like cattle.  My horse (Dunny) didn’t like buffalo and he looked for them the rest of the day.  I started paying attention to horses and how they reacted to buffalo.  I have been around horses and buffalo enough to be impressed with the Indian buffalo horse. He was a special horse and I can see why. Any time you can ride up on a herd of stampeding buffalo and kill one with a spear or bow and arrow is impressive to me. I would call it extreme sport .   I promise you I couldn’t get close enough on Dunny to kill one with a 30-30.