November^ 1944 



Bellrose: Duck Populations and Kill 



351 



Table 9. — Average daily kill per shooter, Duck Island Preserve, 1914-1936. 



*Data assembled by Dr. R. E. Yeatter and Dr. D. H. Thompson of the Illinois Natural History Survey. 

 tDesignated in the record book as canvasback, redhead, gadwall, golden-eye, blackjack, bluebill, spoonbill, 

 widgeon, butterball and black mallard. 



JThis figure is unusually high because of 157 green-winged teals killed December 8-9, 1920. 



the period of this study due to differ- 

 ences in the chronology of flight, but the 

 low pressure on lesser scaups in 1942 ap- 

 pears attributable to the fact that the 

 enormous numbers present in that year 

 materially lowered the percentage killed, 

 tables 7 and 8. 



In the years of this study, coots, or 

 mud hens, were subject to little shooting 

 in the Illinois River valley because most 

 club hunters there showed little interest 

 in pursuing them. Mississippi River 

 shooters killed coots in somewhat greater 

 numbers per hunter-day. In the Chain- 

 o'-Lakes region of northeastern Illinois, 

 coots were considered a sporting bird, 

 worthy of real hunting effort. On 

 Grass Lake, opening day, 1942, hunters 

 killed at least 24,000 coots (Bellrose 

 1944). Evidently, most waterfowl 

 hunters in that region were interested 

 mainly in coots, for, as the coot bag 

 declined, fewer persons hunted, despite 

 an increase in the daily individual duck 

 bag. 



About 40 per cent of the coot flight, 

 ifig. 9, had arrived in the Illinois River 

 valley by the middle of October, the 

 opening date for most recent waterfowl 

 seasons. If the opening date were 

 earlier, undoubtedly many more coots 

 iwould be killed by Illinois hunters. 

 j Influence of Population Density.— 

 The popular assumption that the water- 

 fowl kill is directly proportional to the 



population is not substantiated by data 

 gathered during this study. Both per- 

 hunter and total daily kills were highest 

 during the early part of recent seasons, 

 figs. 5-7, before flights had reached 

 their peaks. 



Records of the Duck Island Preserve, 

 near Banner, Illinois, from 1914 through 

 1936, table 9, show that the average 

 daily kill per member at this hunting 

 club varied but little from September 20 

 through December 5.* The daily kill 

 before and after those dates was some- 

 what lower. Table 9 shows that blue- 

 winged teals and pintails made up the 

 bulk of the early season bag, with mal- 

 lards not forming an appreciable part 

 of the daily kill until the week of 

 October 11-17. As shown by figs. 3-7, 

 ducks do not arrive in large numbers in 

 the Illinois River valley until the middle 

 of October. The fact that the water- 

 fowl population was many times greater 

 from October 15 through December 5 

 than up to that time does not appear to 

 have added much to the daily kill of 

 the hunter. 



The comparatively high kill per 

 hunter-day early in the season might 

 indicate (1) that more hunters hunt dur- 

 ing the latter part of the season than the 



^Records on which table 9 and fig. 1 7 are based were 

 made available through courtesy of Ferd Luthy, 

 Secretary-Treasurer, Duck Island Preserve; figures sum- 

 marized by Dr. R. E. Yeatter and Dr. D. H. Thompson 

 of the Illinois Natural History Survey. 



