136 



Illinois Natural History Survey Bulletin 



Vol. 27, Art. 2 



when lUiiujis waters were bein^ studied 

 intensively by Forbes and his colleagues, 

 most of the remaining Illinois fishes were 

 described by such famous zoologists as 

 Jordan, Cope, Gilbert, Nelson, and 

 Forbes himself. 



A regional list treating the fishes of the 

 Chicago area was prepared by Robert 

 Kennicott (1855), and comprehensive 

 catalogs of the fishes of the entire state 

 appeared in the first volume of the Bulle- 

 tin (Nelson 1876; Jordan 1878). Sev- 

 eral years later Forbes (1884) prepared 

 a third catalog of Illinois fishes, and early 

 in the present century Thomas Large 

 (1903) published a fourth list. 



Some time in the 1870's Forbes seems 

 to have developed the idea of producing a 

 well-illustrated and detailed account of 

 the Illinois fishes which would be useful 

 for all the Mississippi River states. Year 

 after year, wagon parties were sent to ex- 

 plore and collect in different streams of 

 the state until finally records were avail- 

 able for virtually every river and rill in 

 Illinois. Along the Illinois River large 

 collections were made year after year. 

 Some extensive collecting parties visited 

 localities in neighboring states. The 

 amount of human endeavor that went 

 into this project is monumental and rep- 

 resents the steadfast patience and toil of 

 30 years. The final report, The Fishes 

 of Illinois and its Atlas, by Forbes & Rich- 

 ardson (1908), summarized all this in- 

 formation and featured a remarkable set 

 of color plates prepared by Lydia Hart. 



Since the appearance of the Forbes & 

 Richardson report, two other contribu- 

 tions have been made by the Natural His- 

 tory Survey to Illinois fish taxonomy. D. 

 H. Thompson & F. D. Hunt (1930) 

 published a report on the fishes of Cham- 

 paign County, and D. J. O'Donnell 

 (1935) published an annotated list of 

 Illinois fishes. 



Birds. — Before 1858 there was an 

 abundance of illustrative and synoptic 

 references to North American birds by 

 Wilson, Nuttall, Audubon, and others, 

 and there were local lists of Illinois birds 

 bv Robert Kennicott (1855) and H. 

 Pratten (1855). Later, R. H. Holder 

 (1861ff) published a list of Illinois birds 

 and a short taxidermy manual in the 

 Transactions of the Illinois Natural His- 



tory Society. In 1881 Robert Ridgway 

 published a revised catalog and, a few 

 years later, two large reports, the two 

 volumes of The Ornithologx of Illinois 

 (Ridgway 1881, 1889, 1895). The first 

 volume was destroyed by fire in the state 

 printer's ofSce and had to be completely 

 reprinted before it was issued. These two 

 volumes were among the pioneers in the 

 use of structural characters in keying the 

 birds of an area. Ridgway, a native of 

 Illinois, was not an employee of the state 

 but wrote these volumes because of his 

 intense interest in Illinois birds. 



In later years Forbes, A. O. Gross, and 

 Frank Smith made many observations on 

 Illinois birds, but these studies were pri- 

 marily of an ecological nature. 



Amphibians and Reptiles. — Survev 

 studies concerned with these animals did 

 not start until the 1880's. In the first vol- 

 ume of the Bulletin, N. S. Davis, Jr., & 

 F. L. Rice (1883) published a catalog of 

 amphibians and reptiles found east of the 

 Mississippi River. H. Garman (1890) 

 also studied these groups. No synoptic 

 collections were kept of the early ma- 

 terial. In the 1930's Francis Lueth and 

 Willard Stanley accumulated records and 

 assembled several hundred specimens. In 

 the early 1940's the Natural History Sur- 

 vey focused attention on these groups 

 through the co-operation of H. K. Gloyd 

 of the Chicago Academy of Sciences, C. 

 H. Pope of the Chicago Natural History 

 Museum, and H. M. Smith of the Uni- 

 versity of Illinois. In 1947 P. W. Smith 

 initiated an intensive study of these ani- 

 mals, making collections in all parts of 

 the state and plotting the variation and 

 distribution of each species. In 1957 this 

 project culminated in a comprehensive 

 report on the amphibians and reptiles of 

 Illinois; the report is now awaiting pub- 

 lication. 



Mammals. — The Natural History 

 Survey and its parent agencies have pub- 

 lished only a small number of reports on 

 Illinois mammals. The first, by Cyrus 

 Thomas (1861/*), was published by the 

 Natural History Society. Early in the 

 present century, F. E. Wood (1910^) 

 published on the mammals of Champaign 

 County. In the 1930's C. O. Mohr be- 

 came interested in the mammal fauna of 

 Illinois and gathered a great deal of in- 



