Wildlife Research 



THOMAS G. SCOTT 



\\7 ILDLIFE was high on the scale 

 'of human values during the period 

 of discovery and initial settlement in Illi- 

 nois. When the Illinois Natural History 

 Society was founded in 1858, most II- 

 linoisans were self-reliant farmers who 

 measured values in terms of the length of 

 fences constructed, the acreage of cleared 

 forest land, the acreage of land under 

 cultivation, and the extent of drainage 

 programs, roadways, and railroads. The 

 Illinois Central Railroad line from Chi- 

 cago to the junction of the Ohio and Mis- 

 sissippi rivers had been completed only 2 

 years earlier. Representative of the period 

 are the reflections of Benjamin F. John- 

 son, chairman of a committee for the 

 examination of farms and nurseries for 

 the Illinois State Agricultural Society. In 

 reporting on improvements in "northern 

 Illinois" following inspections in 1859 by 

 the committee, Johnson (1861:84) un- 

 doubtedly impressed members of the So- 

 ciety when he stated that 



the progress of improvement in this portion 

 of Illinois is little less than wonderful. Ten 

 years ago much of the country was wild, open 

 prairie ; now there is scarcely a rood of un- 

 inclosed land, except portions of the timber 

 along the rivers and streams. 



Today one cannot help but ponder why 

 there weren't a few rebels hardy enough 

 to stand against the surge of progress and 

 insist that Illinois, the settlers' "prairie 

 state," set aside a prairie park or primitive 

 forest for future generations. 



The loss of primitive areas and much of 

 what went with them was accepted as 

 inevitable. Even Dr. Stephen A. Forbes 

 ( 1912Z' :40) , a giant among the naturalists 

 of the time, pointed out that the reduc- 

 tion and elimination of wildlife through 

 settlement of Illinois by white man 



has evidently been a perfectly natural and 

 inevitable one — as much so as the flow of 

 the tide in the wake of the revolving moon 

 — and immensely advantageous, also, from 

 every point of view except that of the in- 

 adequate, incompetent and ill-adapted popu- 

 lation which it [settlement] has reduced or 

 suppressed. 



Dr. Theodore H. Frison (1938:19), 

 who knew and understood Forbes as well 

 as anyone, quoted the above statement as 

 representative of the philosophy of 1912. 



DEVELOPMENT 



Wildlife research, as it is recognized to- 

 day, first became evident in the annals of 

 the Natural History Survey in the late 

 1870's when Forbes initiated his inves- 

 tigation of the food of birds. O. B. Ga- 

 lusha (1881:238) provided insight into 

 the conception of this research when, 

 following Forbes' presentation of a paper 

 on the food of meadowlarks at the Janu- 

 ary, 1881, meeting of the Horticultural 

 Society of Northern Illinois, he observed 



that when a few of us, six years ago, met in 

 the Normal University, as a committee of the 

 State Horticultural Society, to inaugurate the 

 enterprise, I had serious fears that the work 

 was too great for accomplishment. 



These studies accompanied and prob- 

 ably assisted in the accomplishment of the 

 reorganization which converted the Illi- 

 nois Museum of Natural History into a 

 State Laboratory of Natural History on 

 July 1, 1877. The reorganization was ac- 

 companied by a new conception of pur- 

 pose, relieving the members of the stafiF 

 of the preparation of museum displays and 

 allowing them to concentrate on research. 

 Although I have been unable to uncover 

 direct evidence of it, I feel certain that 

 the change was manipulated by Forbes 

 and members of the Illinois State Horti- 

 cultural Society. Of legislative action ap- 

 proved Mav 29, 1879, to become effective 

 July 1, 1879, Forbes (1880/:!) gener- 

 ously reported : 



We were also directed to investigate the large 

 and intricate subject of the food of birds, in 

 the interests of agriculture and horticulture, 

 $200 per annum being voted for the expenses 

 of this work. 



Forbes' research on the food of birds 

 was to become one of the outstanding con- 

 tributions to avian biology. This research 



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