The film opens with Rex Allen as the narrator, guiding us into the world of Lobo, a six-week-old wolf pup who looks just like his brothers and sisters. While his father, El Feroz, is out hunting to feed the family, Lobo’s curiosity pulls him toward his first big adventure. A misstep sends him tumbling down the cliff that shelters their den, but he claws his way back up. Just then, a cougar appears, threatening the pups. The danger is momentarily redirected when a group of cattlemen riding below the wolves’ den spots the cougar and shoots it as it lunges. The narrator makes it clear that the cattlemen do not favor the wolves, and Lobo’s life is spared only because he’s out of sight. When El Feroz returns, he picks up the scent of both cougar and cattlemen and decides his family must move their den to a safer place.
As the family travels in search of a new home, Lobo’s world broadens and he encounters a range of creatures. A fierce badger disputes ownership of a den, and the badger wins the exchange through a display of skill and wit. Lobo, meanwhile, wanders off during the move and forms a budding friendship with a tortoise, tests his bite on an armadillo’s ear, and is briefly cornered by a rattlesnake before his parents arrive to rescue him. Growing older, Lobo also develops an unusual companionship with a young antelope, hinting at the complex social currents of life on the frontier.
At six months old, Lobo begins to hunt with the pack. Their prey shifts from buffalo to the cattle herds being driven across the desert. This change in prey draws the ire of the cattlemen, who intensify their vendetta against the wolves. In a cruel turn of events, Lobo’s parents are killed as the cattlemen press their campaign against the wolves. Winter settles in, and Lobo steps into independence for the first time, fending for himself in a harsher landscape.
With spring comes a new chapter: Lobo joins a fresh pack, defeats its leader, and claims a mate. The pair—and their growing pack—continue preying on the cattle herds, yet Lobo remains wary of the cattlemen who offer rewards for his capture or death. As the pack eventually splits to mate and raise their own pups, Lobo and his mate discover a secure den tucked away in an abandoned dwelling, reachable only by a precarious bridge that tests their balance and courage.
The conflict between wolves and cattlemen escalates as Lobo pushes deeper into unsettled territory. To end the threat, a professional hunter from Texas arrives with a team of tracking hounds—a bloodhound and a pack of coonhounds (Black and Tan, Bluetick, Redbone, Treeing Walker)—plus his killer wolfhound. He lays a trap for Lobo and ensnares Lobo’s mate, using her as a lure. Yet Lobo orchestrates a daring response: he steers his pack to provoke a cattle stampede, a risky diversion that frees his mate and allows them to press on toward safer climes.
