maxwell wildlife refuge - territorialmagazine.com issues/2014/34_4_issue... · refuge is the home...

66 T E R R I TOR I A L M AGA Z I N E NOvEMbER, DEcEMbER & JANuARy 2015 T E R R I TOR I A L M AGA Z I N E 67NOvEMbER, DEcEMbER & JANuARy 2015

By L. Robert Pyle pointed at the map in front of me. My wife looked over the breakfast table at me and raised her eyebrows -- or would have if she had eyebrows, which she doesn’t, except those made by a pencil. I will admit that, even at my advanced age, I don’t understand the purpose of that primitive custom -- pluck out eyebrow hair to replace it with grease pencil. Oh, well. I looked down at the map again and said: “We are going on another ad-venture.” I heard the pot and pan drawer open and looked up. She had a frying

Ipan in her hand. Either I was going to get breakfast or I better watch my next few words carefully. “Where this time, Magellan?” “Maxwell Wildlife Refuge.” She lowered her head and looked at me through her frowning brow (with those


thin, grease pencil lines.) “How far?” “Ah, this time it really is just up the road. It is just east of McPherson, Kansas. Maybe a 90 minute ride.” “Why would I want to go there?” “Well, first of all, ’cause your lover man wants you to. In addition, there is a buffalo herd, an elk herd, and a tram to take you where you can see them.” She smirked. “How would you know what my lover man wants me to do? Oh, you mean you.” Then she guffawed and slapped her leg. Her sense of humor often does not involve humor.When she could straighten up again, she said, “So, there is a shop?” Most languages have a gender to the nouns -- femi-nine, masculine and neuter. English does not. We don’t need that type, but we do need some way to declare that a word has a feminine or a masculine meaning when spoken. To a man, a shop is a place of tools and machin-ery overlaid with a thin layer of grease. The refuge prob-ably had equipment to repair; ergo, there must be a shop. “Yeah, there’s a shop -- they would have to have one.” She looked at me puzzled but nodded. “OK, Pizzaro, let’s go.” The area from Wichita, KS to McPherson is mostly rural, with Newton stuck in there just to break up the cow pastures. There is a mystery on this route, though. I mentioned it to my hausfrau as we traveled.“Say, did you notice that we crossed Middle Emma creek?” She nodded. “I saw the sign. So?” “Well, we are coming up on West Emma creek. There, we just crossed it.” She nodded again. “OK, saw that sign, too. That brings us back to so wh…. Say, I don’t remember any East Emma creek.” “Ah!” I said. “That is the mystery.” We rode in silence, contemplating this missing creek. Leave it up to KDOT to lose a whole watercourse. Fi-nally, I said: “Of course, we should be grateful that the creek didn’t run the other way so that there would be a North Emma creek.” My wife cut her eyes toward me and said, “OK, I know I will regret asking this, but why should we be grateful?” “’Cause on the map, that would have been N Emma Creek and no one would get near it. Har! Har!”She grimaced. “Now, that was truly sophomoric.” We turned onto US-56 and traveled east for several miles to the little town of Canton. A sign on the highway directed us north to Maxwell Wildlife Refuge. As we turned, my wife said: “Hey, look an antique store.” Luckily, I was able to swerve and speed up to ensure

MAy, JuNE & JuLy 2014

Maxwell Wildlife RefugeBy L. Robert Pyle

Have you ever stood on a 40-foot high observation tower on top of the high hill in a 35 mph south wind and watched an eagle move effortlessly, with a minimum of wing movement, southbound? Have you ever looked eye-to-eye with a bull elk as he leads his harem out of the cottonwoods and underbrush along a stream? Have you ever sat in the middle of a herd of buffalo as they graze on the rich prairie grass all around you? All of these experiences are available in a small bit of wilderness in the middle of Kansas. Maxwell Wildlife Refuge is the home of a large buffalo herd, an elk herd, and all of the smaller wildlife that inhabited the plains 150 years ago. This 4 1/2 square mile preserve is open to the public, including a tram ride around and sometimes through the buffalo herd. Forget the elk. They are skit-tish. You may never get near them, except by accident. When the accident occurs, though, it is a breath-taking, heart-thumping experience as the herd thunders away across the open, grass-covered plains east of McPherson, Kansas. The 2,560 acre refuge, just north of Canton, Kansas was established in 1943 by a donation of land from Henry Maxwell to the Kansas Forestry, Fish and Game Commission. The far western 300 acres was designat-ed for a state fishing lake which today boasts bass and crappy. On the western side of the lake is a campground that is a great place to find peace and quiet. By 1951, the elk and bison herds had been estab-lished and today the bison number 350 -- the largest public herd in the state. Maxwell Wildlife Refuge is the only place in the state where both elk and bison can be viewed on natural prairie. The Don Brown Memorial shooting range is located on the southeastern corner of the property. This is a 100- yard public rifle/pistol range. Shotguns are only permit-ted for patterning or sighting in for deer slugs. The refuge is located on the southwestern portion of the Flint Hills. The green hills spread out from the 40 feet tall observation tower in long, low waves like frozen ripples from a rock thrown in this pond of grass. The refuge is accessible by paved road by traveling east on US-56 from McPherson or traveling west from Emporia on US-50 then north on US-77 to US-56 and west on US-56 to Canton. A north turn on highway 86 in Canton will lead to the entrance of the refuge.

Some information for this article was obtained from the KDWP&T website: You may view more info and contact information at http://kdwpt.state.ks.us/KDWPT-Info/Lo-cations/Wildlife-Areas/Region-4/Maxwell.


we missed that trap. My wife looked wistfully behind us, then turned back to me and commented: “You said there was a shop at the park?” I nodded. We drove on over rolling hills on a

two-lane blacktop road. The sign said eight miles. As we turned onto the dirt road that bisects the refuge, we pulled to a stop. On the left, staring at us from the other side of a chain link fence, was a shaggy

monster. My wife gasped, opened the car door, and got out. She said, “Look at that. I had no idea they were so big. Skinny legs, shaggy hair all over the neck and face, skinny hips and broad shoulders, sad brown eyes . . .” I smirked. “Sounds like a descrip-tion of your mother. “ She ignored me. I got the camera out of the car and set up the tripod. There were several beasts within view, and I moved to-ward the fence to get a shot of all of them. “Don’t get close to them. They will probably bite,” my wife yelled as I struggled through the high grass. Even dressed in shorts, sandals and a T-shirt, I managed to get all the way to the fence where I faced a drooling bull about 10 yards away. I turned to-ward the car and yelled, “Would Bear Grylls ever worry about such things?” I saw my wife’s eyes go round and heard loud, rapid clomping behind me. I turned to see the bull charging the fence. I bravely stood my ground to get a great picture (That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.) At the last minute it slid to a stop and snorted. Something wet and slimy hit my bare thighs and started to ooze down onto my shins. The bull made a rumbling sound deep


in its throat. Sounded like chuckling to me. I heard someone yelling, “Eew-wwww! I got buffalo drool all over my legs.” Yea, it was me still bravely standing my ground, but forgetting to snap the shutter. I began to shake all over and jumped around in the tall grass (Have you ever tried to shake both legs at the same time?) Finally, I shook one leg, then quickly hopped to that foot and shook the other leg. Then back again. My wife began to whistle a tune and clap time. The giggles, though, kept her from keeping good time. Finally, I leap-frogged the high grass toward the car. I reached inside for some paper towels and began to wipe the bison drool (and less desir-able things (if that is possible) off my legs and feet. My wife, fully support-ive and obviously concerned with my welfare, wrapped her arms around her belly, made a terribly distressed face, and fell back on the car fender making loud cackling noises. “Bear Grylls?” she gasped. “A bare girl maybe, but not Bear Grylls.” She then fell back to making that cackling sound. After the application of half a roll of paper towels, my legs and sandals were clean or, at least less tacky. I got back into the driver’s seat and beeped the horn. My wife jumped off the fend-er then bent over wiping her eyes. She walked around the car and climbed into the passenger seat. “Hey, sweety.” I looked over at her. She started to speak then put her hand to her mouth and snickered. She got con-trol, dropped her hand, and got a seri-ous look on her face. “You think that is drool on your leg? Believe me, it’s not.” She doubled over again, guffaw-ing loudly. As I said, her sense of hu-mor often requires no humor at all. I put the car in gear. “Gee. Now we’ve gone from sophomoric to junior high school.” She nodded and then sniggered loudly.

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I accelerated down the dirt road to-ward the ranger station. All along the route, buffalo grazed on the hillsides. On the right, a sudden crash in the underbrush heralded the bursting out of a small group of Elk. The large, powerful animals thun-dered away across the meadow. My wife had quit laughing by then and was engrossed in the view. We approached a sign that said, “Tram Rides” with an arrow point-ing left. I turned into the dirt road en-trance and stopped at a large metal gate blocking the route. A sign on the gate said, “Tram Rides By Appoint-ment Only.” I looked at my wife. She looked back. “I guess we didn’t make an ap-pointment, did we?” I shook my head. “Oh, well. We still got to see the bison and elk. They were very impressive.” She nodded. “And you were pretty impressive, too, Bear.” Then the cack-ling started again. “You sound like Hillary on her book tour when somebody finally bought one.” That quieted her down. She said, “Well, at least we can go to the shop. Where is it?” I shook my head. “I don’t know.”“You told me there would be a shop here.” I nodded, “And there probably is. They have to have a place to fix all the equipment they use here.” Her eyebrows (actually, her grease pencil line) rose and she shouted, “Not a shop, idjit, a SHOP!” “Huh?” “A shop -- a place to shop.” I slapped my leg. “You mean a store.” I said, laughing. “A store is what you meant? Of course there aren’t any stores, Sweets. This is a game refuge.” She grimaced again and said, “OK, I’m sorry for the buffalo goo on your leg. Fair’s fair. Now, where is the gift shop?” I shook my head. “A game refuge,” I repeated. She stared for several seconds. Then she faced forward and crossed her arms in front of her, hands grip-

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ping opposite elbows. I put the car in gear and drove on to the observation tower. The tower is about 40 feet high and provides a view of the whole park and surrounding area. I jumped from the car and raced to the top. Peace and quiet greeted me -- or would have if my gasping had not interfered. I turned to encourage my wife’s climb but there was no one on the stairs. I looked around and was captivated by the view of the western-most reach of the Flint Hills. Buffalo were visible in the fields all around, hawks and buzzards soared over the fields hunt-ing dinner, and a female elk lay in the grass just downhill from the platform. I sighed, enjoying everything. After a few minutes, I decided it was time to go find my wife. I jumped in the car and found a stone statue sitting in the passenger seat. Always one to be on top of ev-erything, I said “Uh-oh.” The stone statue did not react. “Imagine,” I laughed. “An old cou-ple like us having such a basic misun-derstanding.” The statue’s right toe began to tap the floor mat. “Hmmm. You seem to have had your heart set on a gift store, huh?” The tapping continued and the grease pencil lines drew together. “OK, I will admit that I may have contributed to the misunderstanding a little.” She looked over at me as if to say, “A little?” I shrugged and continued, “What can I do to make up for my small part in this misunderstanding?” “Canton! Antiques!” she barked. I shuddered but recovered. “One store! One half hour!” She squinted at me and her lips moved once to each side like she was tasting the idea. Then she nodded. “Done.” We pulled onto the dirt road and headed for Canton.

maxwell wildlife refuge - territorialmagazine.com issues/2014/34_4_issue... · refuge is the home...

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