Seton’s Animals

Inspired by my article “One or Several Lobos?” I have begun investigating Ernest Thompson Seton’s journals in earnest. Having overcome the first hurdle of gaining access to his journals, I’m now faced with the issue of reading his handwriting. I briefly considered AI transcription services but I’m not confident in their privacy policies. Plus I want the satisfaction of toiling my way through his scribbled daily entries myself. There is something oddly intimate about following someone’s daily records and seeing all the little things that they found important enough to write down.

One unpleasant suprise has been the sheer number of animals that Seton killed —intentionally or unintentionally— on his trip. Even though he was in New Mexico in 1893 to hunt wolves, the long list of birds and mammals killed by his poisons, traps, and bullets is quite staggering. I sought this journal expecting to read about the wolves he killed, but I am finding traces of a great many other animals as well. Generally he doesn’t record much other than the individual’s species, sex, approximate age, and the dimensions of their body. Occasionally he includes details of injuries, parasites, or infections. Yet sometimes he will describe the setting in which he found them, including evidence of other animals nearby. These moments feel melancholy, even though they are recorded as dry facts. Maybe that’s just the effect of reading too many of Seton’s animal stories. Even if he does not offer much page space to the deaths of these animals, I have read enough of his vivid descriptions of animal lives to insert something of them here and imagine the histories of the corpses he collects.

Seton’s records also remind us that poisons and traps are deadly for all animals in the area, not just the intended target species. He barely caught any wolves but he killed a lot of other animals along the way.