Bobwhite 69 



The probability is that ragweed is mainly the result of slackened competi- 

 tion. Suitable soils probably always contain seed, ready to take advantage of 

 openings in sod or crops, especially openings during the early summer season. 

 That the species prefers rich soil is indicated by the heavy growth which occurs 

 on the spots where pheasant or poultry pens have been located. Its prevalence 

 on abandoned fields in the Ozarks, however, indicates that it will also grow on 

 poor land, if that is the only place where it can find openings. Ragweed is most 

 abundant in the riverbreak type on the soils of the Illinoian glaciation, and in 

 rhe prairie type. It is often a pest in pastures, where it shades out the grass in 

 late summer. Possibly its occurrence in pastures is associated with openings in 

 the sod caused by white grubs or overgrazing. If, as is alleged in Indiana, crows 

 are an important enemy of white grubs, we have a new chain of cause and effect in 

 bird phenomona. 



The Missouri Agricultural College advocates clipping of pastures during mid- 

 summer with a hay mower to prevent the spread of ragweed and other weeds. 

 Clipping is widely practiced in the northern counties, especially Pike County. 

 It of course operates against the quail, but is necessarily limited to open pastures 

 on smooth land. Here is one more agricultural practice operating against game. 

 The remedy would seem to lie in allowing the game crop to acquire a cash value, 

 thus enabling it to compete with other crops in determining farm practice. 



The quail in the Ozarks and in the hill type, now subsisting on ragweed 

 in old fields, may possibly decline when the processes of plant succession have 

 caused other plants to crowd out the ragweed. It is quite certain that ragweed 

 occupies old fields only for a limited number of years after their abandonment, 

 after which it is replaced by timber, grass, or other plants. This detail is men- 

 tioned to illustrate how favorable game conditions are often the result of tem- 

 porary and accidental environmental changes. 



In the South, running a tractor across abandoned fields renews the suc- 

 cession and leaves a crop of ragweed in its wake. 



Tick Trefoil and Woods Quail. In the Ozarks, and in the hill type of 

 southern Illinois and Indiana, quail hunters use the term "woods quail" to 

 indicate covies inhabiting range composed entirely of timber. There is a tradi- 

 tion that these woods birds are extra large and heavy, but the survey disclosed no 

 evidence to either prove or disprove this belief. 



Woods quail are usually a temporary, but sometimes a permanent phenome- 

 non. In the foothills of Ripley County, Missouri, during certain fall seasons, 

 nearly all of the quail temporarily leave the fields to inhabit woods, where they 

 are said to feed upon huckleberries, grapes, or mast. It appears, however, that 

 these same covies shift back to the farms when the season advances and food 

 conditions become more favorable there. 



In parts of the main Ozarks, however, a thin but permanent quail popula- 

 tion inhabits the woods yearlong. Thus in the vicinity of Deer Run State Park 

 there are about five covies of woods quail per section on a tract of land cut over 



