May II, 1912 
FOREST AND STREAM 
595 
The Moa 
Speculations of Richard Henry 
By ALLEN KELLY 
“It is very hard to size up a pair of tusks 
in a living elephant. The beast is so large that 
the tusks look small. However, Hoey pointed 
to the one on my right and said it was a good 
one. Another good one was behind a tree and 
two rather smaller ones nearer us on my left. 
I could see no others. I took plenty of time, 
knelt down, and gave the bull both barrels of 
my .450, aiming back of the shoulder. Hoey 
also fired. The other went off to our left, pass¬ 
ing about forty yards distanct. The scrub was 
so thick that I could not see to shoot as they 
went through it, but Hoey got in a shoulder shot 
on the next biggest, but it did not stop. The 
one I hit first faced toward us, and I gave him 
both barrels again, aiming at the base of the 
trunk for the brain shot. He turned slowly and 
I gave him two shots again, aiming for the 
heart, and as he went off, put two more into 
his back, trying to break him down. One of 
my first shots must have touched his heart, 
though, for he gradually went down, falling on 
his left side as an elephant almost always does 
when shot. He had very fine and beautifully 
shaped tusks which, when chopped out and 
cleaned next day, weighed ninety-eight pounds. 
“I am satisfied now, and I never want to shoot 
another elephant.” 
Conservation Committee Appointments. 
Albany, N. Y., April 30. — Editor Forest and 
Stream: The Conservation Commission an¬ 
nounced the following appointments to-day 
which take effect May i: 
Division chief game protector, Byron A. Cam¬ 
eron, Saranac Lake, in place of Ira E. Feather- 
ston, resigned. 
GAME PROTECTORS. 
Chemung—Michael C. Murphy, Horseheads. 
Wayne-—George Davis, Lyons. 
Washington—John J. McDonough, Granville. 
Broome—Dennis E. Keefe, Binghamton. 
Fulton—C. H. Masten, Gloversville. 
Livingston—Lewis S. Morris, Scottsburg. 
Rensselaer—Patrick F. Butler, Troy. 
New York—F. Bauernschmidt, 31 Ninth Ave. 
Saratoga—Newton A. Scott, Greenfield Center 
(reinstated). 
Ldster—Fred De Witt, Napanoch. 
Westchester—Benj. M. Bailey, White Plains. 
Allegany—Verne A. Zimmer, Canaseraga. 
Albany—W. L. Delaney, Albany. 
Onondaga—Elton B. Downing, LaFayette. 
Steuben—Henry Hefferman, Hammondsport. 
Putnam—Joseph Barry, Carmel. 
St. Law'rence—John H. Mallett, Ogdensburg. 
Warren—Morgan Leland, Glens Falls (rein¬ 
stated). 
Large Rabbit Crop in Illinois. 
Bloomington, Ill., April 30 .—Editor Forest and 
Stream: Antone Shappe and Thomas Faulkner, 
two young men of Gifford, claim to hold the 
record for rabbit killing in Central Illinois.. 
They have devoted much of their time to the 
pastime since the corn husking period of last 
fall and have kept a careful record of their 
slaughter. In all 1,400 of the bunnies were laid 
low and shipped to the markets. Chicago re¬ 
ceived most of their consignments and the de¬ 
mand has kept up strongly through the winter. 
The season recently closed was favorable to the 
sport. E. E. Pierson. 
S EVERAL species of flightless birds still exist 
in Australasia, among them the emu, the 
cassowary, the kiwi and the weka, but the 
largest of the type, the moa or Dinornis, became 
extinct so recently that it may be possible that 
a very old native of New Zealand could have 
seen a living specimen. 
Maoris of this generation assert that their an¬ 
cestors hunted the moa in the early part of the 
nineteenth century, and the finding of complete 
and perfectly preserved skeletons of the gigantic 
bird seems to corroborate the tradition. The moa 
was much like the ostrich in general appearance, 
but much larger and heavier. The leg bones of 
a complete skeleton in the Auckland museum are 
heavier than those of a large horse, and the 
whole frame indicates that the bird was strong 
enough to carry a man’s weight easily. It is a 
Maori tradition that the moa was used as a 
mount by the old warriors and was a very fleet 
and formidable charger, but whether or not 
there is any credible testimony in support of 
the tradition I am unable to say. One sees in 
New Zealand pictures of Maoris riding Dinornis, 
but they are the fanciful productions of artists 
and are not to be accepted as evidence. Also 
there are pictures of Maori hunters in terrific 
combat with the big bird, but the ferocity or 
pugnacity of the moa is very questionable, and 
there are reasons for supposing that the bird 
was no more belligerent than the ostrich. 
In a New Zealand Government report, printed 
some seven or eight years ago, I find some specu¬ 
lations concerning the moa by Richard Henry, 
the ornithologist in charge of the Government’s 
bird preserve on Resolution Island, from whose 
reports I have dug out interesting matter now 
.and then for Forest and Stream readers. Mr. 
Henry takes issue with a learned professor, who 
asserted that sixteen species of moa lived in 
New' Zealand at the same time. The professor, 
it appears, had been surprised at, his own dis¬ 
covery, which, he said, w'as “a most unexpected 
result, since all other great flightless birds in¬ 
habit each its own country or district. In the 
whole of Australia, for instance, there are only 
tw'o species of emeu and one of cassowary, while 
no few'er than seven species of moa have been 
found in one swamp.” Mr. Henry suggests that 
it all depends upon what constitutes a species, 
and says: “Under like conditions the learned 
professor, with a cargo of bones, would have 
given us at least fifty different species of dogs, 
when with only a cartload of bones he made 
us out a dozen different species of moas. There 
were tall, greyhound-like moas, and stout mas¬ 
sive ones, and on down to Dandy Dinmont things 
not above two feet high. This great variety 
living together suggests the interference of men, 
for surely without such there would not be so 
many different kinds of dogs and fowls as w’e 
have with us now. There were identical species 
of moas in both islands, which is wonderful 
when we remember their aptitude for variation, 
and to my thinking almost proof that the old 
natives farmed them as we farm sheep and 
transported them with the other ground birds 
from one island to the other.” 
That the moa was brought from Madagascar 
to New Zealand by the early Maori navigators, 
who sailed to and from New Zealand 600 years 
ago, when Englishmen were afraid to go out of 
sight of land, is considered probable by Richard 
Henry. Many words in the Maori and Mada¬ 
gascan languages are identical, which would in¬ 
dicate direct communication. That is only specu¬ 
lation, however, and Henry points out that if 
the Maoris found the moa in New Zealand, the 
birds, having no natural enemies, would have 
been quite tame, and it would have been easy 
to herd and tend them. 
The finding of stone spear heads with moa 
bones is strong evidence that the bird was 
hunted, and Mr. Henry argues that the moa 
hunters were recent Maoris developed into hunt¬ 
ers of peaceful men and then following up their 
calling by hunting the moa off the earth. 
Mr. Llenry tells of finding in the hills near 
Manapouri Lake a Maori oven, and near it on 
the surface a patch of moa gizzard stones. On 
the south of Te Anau, another lake, a few feet 
above high water, he says, patches of gizzard 
stones are easy to find after a fern fire, lying on 
the surface of alluvial soil quite apart from other 
stones. They are of any size from that of peas 
up to small hen eggs, probably representing dif¬ 
ferent sizes or ages of birds, and they tell the 
story of how the birds died there or the hunter 
emptied out the gizzards he wanted to carry 
away for food. 
The most convincing evidence that the moa 
was exterminated but recently is given by Mr. 
Henry in these words: 
“There was an old village at Te Anau occu¬ 
pied perhaps as late as 1840, but also for a very 
long time previously, as shown by the distance 
of some of the sites from the slowly receding 
lake and its driftwood. Yet within a stone’s 
throw of the lake, between the little dunes, a 
party of us found a basketful of big charred 
knuckles and broken moa bones, with the char¬ 
coal in the fire-place still on the surface, as if 
it had been used only a few years before. When I 
first went up there, arrow heads (or spear heads) 
and pieces of moa bone were common finds.” 
The following paragraph is from the Otago 
Witness of the 15th of December, 1898; “Last 
Tuesday, while two dredgemen belonging to the 
Earnscleugh dredge were breaking down the face 
to allow of the dredge working into the bank, 
one of them, Mr. Goad, picked up a moa’s egg. 
A fall of earth consisting of sandy loam had 
just come down in front of the dredge, when 
they saw the egg floating into the well hole. Mr. 
Goad picked it up, placed it on the deck,' and 
proceeded to e.xamine it. The egg was perfect, 
having all the appearance of having been but 
shortly laid. There was not a crack in it nor 
a scratch on it. It measures in length seven and 
one-half inches and five and one-half inches in 
width. Mr. Goad has been offered £75 for his 
find, but he refused the offer.” 
