Even though the Custer State Park Buffalo Roundup went off without a hitch Monday, it provided plenty of thrills for the horses, the riders and the record crowd of spectators.

Don Gannon of Hot Springs, one of about 20 "core" riders who helped keep watch on less experienced riders in the roundup, was only half joking when he said, "It went way too well. We're going to have to get some new buffalo blood."

Still, Gannon was reluctant to ride his 3-year-old paint horse, Trey, in Monday's roundup.

"A 3-year-old is too young to run that much," Gannon said.

However, his more experienced roundup horse is ailing, so Gannon rode Trey, thinking he would hold him back and not run him hard in the chase after the buffalo.

"But I can't do that," Gannon admitted after the roundup. It's too much of an adrenaline rush, for the horse and the rider, to pass up, he said. "It really gets you pumped up."

He said horses get hooked on the adrenaline rush, too.

"Sometimes they're hard to control."

His older horse has been on the roundup for about 10 years.

"He gets worse every year," Gannon said. "He just wants to run. When he gets around these buffalo, he just loves to chase them."

The spectators get a thrill, too, and some of them, such as Mary Winthrop of Hot Springs, keep coming back year after year.

Winthrop, 89, who came with a group of other residents from the Michael J. Fitzmaurice State Veterans Home in Hot Springs, has been coming to the buffalo roundup for six years.

"You can get kind of caught up in it," said Winthrop. "It's just like the Sturgis rally" - which she said she attends regularly.

On Monday, she sported a buffalo hat she bought a year ago and clutched a stuffed toy buffalo she bought from a vendor at the roundup's north viewing area overlooking Lame Johnny Creek.

She and the other spectators got a good view of Gannon, the other riders, and the pickups and SUVs herding more than 1,200 buffalo rumbling over the hills from the south and then west along the creek to the large pasture surrounding the buffalo corrals.

In many previous roundups, there has been at least one group of buffalo that breaks away from the herd and has to be caught and turned around.

Not this year.

Once down along Lame Johnny Creek area, the massive herd began marching steadily west toward the corrals, as if it had been rehearsed.

But then, with the horseback riders whooping and hollering behind them, the herd broke into a dead run the last few hundred yards to the big pasture around the corrals.

The whole roundup, covering about 5 miles, took less than an hour from start to finish, said Chad Kremer, buffalo herd manager for Custer State Park.

The "roundup" of people went well, too, despite a record crowd, said Craig Pugsley, visitor services coordinator for Custer State Park. He said nearly 11,000 people attended last year's roundup, based on a ratio of four people for each of the 2,360 vehicles, plus 29 motor coaches full of people that year.

This year, Pugsley said the roundup drew at least 3,000 vehicles plus 40 motor coaches, for an estimated 14,000 people.

Among the vacationers were Lee and Shirley Jackson and their son, Steve, of Ontonagon, Mich. The Jacksons have been coming to the Black Hills on vacation for years, but Monday was the first time they saw the buffalo thunder past.

"It was pretty impressive," said Lee Jackson, after the last of the buffalo raced into the corral area. "This is one of those events you can't miss."

Ralph Murphy and Julie Wallach of Fort Collins, Colo., had similar opinions after seeing the roundup for the first time.

"It was a nice demonstration of the Old West," Murphy said as he leaned against the fence watching the herd graze.

Wallach was particularly moved by the two cowboys who rode past carrying the U.S. and South Dakota flags.

"That was just lovely," Wallach said.

Monday's roundup capped a three-day festival of arts and crafts displays, food and entertainment.

Even though the event has become a major tourist draw, the roundup's real purpose is to vaccinate the buffalo, to brand the new calves, and to sort out animals that will be sold at the park's annual auction on Nov. 21.

Many spectators stayed after the roundup to watch the action in the corrals, where crews worked on a small group of buffalo that had been penned on Friday, giving them a couple days to settle down before they were pushed into squeeze chutes to be vaccinated and branded.

For the same reason, work on the approximately 1,225 buffalo rounded up Monday won't begin until next Monday, said Kremer, the park's herd manager.

For many years, the crews began branding, vaccinating and sorting right after the roundup ended.

Two years ago, the park began delaying the corral work for a week.

"When we changed it, there was a noticeable difference on how they fought coming through," Kremer said. "They don't hit the chute near as hard."

Kremer said the park will sell about 250 animals at the auction to keep the herd down to a size that the park's grass will support.

That number likely will include 85 bull calves, 65 heifer calves, about 40 yearling bulls and 40 yearling heifers, 10 2-year-old heifers, and 10 2-year-old bulls.

Kremer said the park crews don't include bulls that are 3 years old and older in the roundup.

"They get too dangerous for other animals and staff," he said.

That could make for a roundup that is less than smooth.

Contact Steve Miller at 394-8415 or steve.miller@rapidcityjournal.com.

By the numbers

14,000 - People in attendance

3,000 - Vehicles

40 - Motor coaches

1,225 - Buffalo rounded up

1,330 - Total Custer State Park herd

250 - Buffalo to be sold