Custer State Park started as a game preserve and the Wildlife Loop Road was one of the first roads laid out in the park. The drive goes in a circle through the open grassland and rolling hills nestled high in the Black Hills. The road is deliberately laid out in the area most likely to provide sightings of many of the animals for which the park is famous. The best part of the Wildlife Loop is the fact that it will most likely be different each time you visit – because the animals roam freely through the park, there are no guarantees and each hour of each day could be different than the last..
We weren’t too sure what we’d see on our wild life drive, since Custer had just conducted the annual Buffalo Roundup the Friday before. Each year, the park herds all their buffalo into corrals for inspection, shots and culling. Within days, the herd is released a bit at a time to return to their grazing land. Since we were so close to the roundup, we weren’t sure how many buffalo had already been released.
Not too surprisingly (considering the season), the road wasn’t very busy and we cruised slowly watching for signs of animals. It didn’t take too long before we found Pronghorn Antelopes casually grazing near the road.
Just before we reached the halfway point on the loop, we decided to take a gravel road turnoff (Old Draw Road) that we thought would give us a chance to get an overview of the buffalo corrals. The quiet road was better than we could have hoped! We found a spot to park that gave us a great overview of the corrals as well as a chance to take a walk with Tyler and simply enjoy the quiet in the middle of Custer.
As we continued along the draw, we found ourselves getting closer to the corrals and the buffalo moving to the open range. We had a great chance to watch the herd walking through the pines along the edge of the corrals under the watchful eye of the lead bull.
As we neared to point where the draw rejoined the loop, Kathy noticed an interesting artifact in the grasses close to the road – she found a buffalo skeleton and skull lying in the open.
Just as we approached state highway 87 to head towards Wind Cave, we ran across one last bit of wildlife – a flock of turkey’s rummaging alongside the road.
