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Show U POISONING PRAIRIE DOGS ON -'NATIONAL FORESTS. 1 j Attempts mada last spring at poisoning pois-oning prairie dogs- in National For-. For-. est on an extensive scale seem to hayc been; highly successful in ridding selected areas of these small pests, - andlplans arc now being miadc to car-iwon car-iwon the work much more widely next year. l-The first experiments in this" line were made in New Mexico by stockman stock-man who has since entered tlte For-cstScrvacc. For-cstScrvacc. In 1901, Dr. C. 'Hart Mcrriam. Chief of the Division of Biological 'Survey of the Department 2 qi Agriculture, made a report upon 'jTliia Prairie Dog of the Great Plains," in which the damage done by the dogs was pointed out, and various methods of poisoning them were suggested. sug-gested. This report of Dr. Mcrriam' may be said to have blazed, the way for practical work in prairie dog cx- termination. I ' Prairie doge arc very obnoxious to 1 tlje stockmen, for they devour much gross and und'ermanc the surface of thej ground with their burrows. Where they establish themselves the destruction of the range is only a question of time. Range improvement in National Forests is one of the chief objects of regulating the grazing. For this rea- - I son the Forest Service is leaving no stone unturned to prevent range dct-crionation. dct-crionation. Stockmen who had suffered' suf-fered' heavily from the prairie dog pcfb were solicitious to have the work taken up, and gladly offered to co-op eratcwith. ,the Service in furnishing . men and horses to distribute the pots- on? h . v !Tol ascertain what success1 could be ndd in rjdd'ing considerable areas "of the pest, a selection was made of parts of the Leadvillc and Pike National Na-tional Forests which were 'badly infested. in-fested. The region in "these Forcsrs upon which the dogs were located aggregated ag-gregated 300 square miles or more. Int order to demonstrate the effectiveness effective-ness of the work an area of some 60 orj 75 thousand acres of actual dog-town dog-town was selected for the test. From 0O1 to 90 per icent of the dogs were ..killed! with the first distribution of the 'poison. It will be necessary to go j oyer the ground a second time and by "spotting" the occupied holes the remaining dogs will easily be killed with a very small amount of the pois- pning material. The average cost per aci;e vfor the poisoning material was only one and one-half cents, and even then it was found that more material liad been used than was-necessary. $ The poison is prepared by coating wheat with a preparation of strych1- . iH' nine, cyanide of potassiumy anise oil, and molasses. When a sufficient quantity is ready, the poisoned wheat V 19 carried to the field of operations. There the stockmen supply men an'd horses, the wheat is given out to the . riders, arid distribution begins. & Each rider carries the wlvcat in (a tin pail supported by a gunny sack. slung across his right shoulder and hanging at his left side. His left hand is free ifor the reins. With his right hand he uses a tablespoon to measure out the poison and drop it near the entrance of the holes1. A little practice prac-tice enables the men to drop the wheat while keeping their horses at a sharp trot. By crossing the town, to and fro, like a man sowing Tgrain, they can cover a large area, in a "surprisingly "sur-prisingly short time. The action of the poison is almost instantaneous. Most of the pfairie dogs in a town arc dfead within a 1 hour or two after the bait is dropped. The work is considered to have demonstrated the entire feasibility-of fighting the prairie dogs in this way. It was foundi however, that to be successful the (poison must be scattered scat-tered in the spring, when the doga first come out from their winter quarters and before the green grasn is offered to appease their hungry appetites. ap-petites. Next spring the poisoning will be undertaken much more extensively. exten-sively. Stockmen and others who wish to try the dog medicine on their own account ican obtain the formula for its preparation and directions for its us'c from the Forest Service. |