American Forestry 



VOL. XVIII APRIL. 1912 No. 4 



tl6RAR\ 



NEW YORI 

 liO'lANiCAl 

 By PERCIVAL S. RIDSDALE ClAwt^o.^ 



THE WAR ON PREDATORY ANIMALS 



44 '^^E was the biggest grizzly I ever saw. He reared up about fifty feet 



^ JJ from me and kept coming. I pumped seven shots into him, the last 



one when he was so close that his blood spurted over me, and he fell 

 dead at my feet." This is the modest statement of forest ranger Dwight L. 

 Moody in describing the killing of the most famous grizzly known on the 

 eastern slope of the Rockies. Moody accomplished what hundreds of men 

 had failed to do in years of trying and, had the last shot not been effective, 

 he probably would not have lived to tell the tale. 



This grizzly weighed 1450 pounds, more than a large horse, and for nearly 

 twenty years had been hunted in vain by ranchers and rangers. It is esti- 

 mated that he killed stock worth |2,000 a year and in the twenty years of 

 his depredations cost the ranchers and stockmen some $40,000. Is it any 

 wonder that they wanted him killed, spent days in trying to get him, and 

 finally offered rewards amounting to |800 to the man who bagged him? 



Old Toto, as he was called, roamed in the southern section of Utah, in 

 what is known as Dixie Land, and he waxed wise, and fat in his many years 

 of high living and sagacious raids upon the stock. Many parties were or- 

 ganized in an effort to hunt him down but all failed, although some claimed 

 to have gotten shots at him at too great a distance to be effective. Finally, 

 in 1907, the ranchmen were so harassed by his persistent killing, — the old 

 brute was wise enough to usually select tender two-year-olds, — that they ap- 

 pealed to the Forest Service to help them in getting Toto. Dwight L. Moody, 

 a ranger who is an experienced hunter, was assigned to the job with an 

 indefinite leave of absence from his regular duties. 



"I'll get him," he said when he started, with several days' provisions and 

 a 30-30 Winchester. This gun is a repeating rifle carrying seven cartridges. 

 Three days later Moody made good. 



He came upon Toto's big trail the first day out, followed him for two 



days into the heart of the mountains and late on the third day overtook him. 



Toto was in a thick scrubby growth of quaking aspens, on a hilly slope. He 



^ had apparently been asleep, for he jumped up suddenly as Moody approached, 



^ stood on his hind quarters and saw the ranger fifty feet away. Moody is a 



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