Predators 229 



contained in addition to kittens, a male and a female adult, evidently the parents. 

 This is presumptive evidence that the two sexes are not antagonistic during the 

 breeding season. 



It is possible to assume that the rarity of dens of young in the wild is due to 

 the rarity of wild females. Keeping a sex tally on wild housecats killed is such a 

 simple and important task that it seems too bad that no one has so far done it. 



Cruising Radius of the Housecat. One of the very important un- 

 answered questions bearing on the depredations of housecats on game is their 

 cruising radius, or the maximum operating distance from headquarters. I have 

 never before had the good fortune to encounter any acceptable evidence bearing on 

 this question until E. L. Schofield, field warden for the southwestern district, 

 cited the following case: 



Harry Downes, manager of the Flower farm on the Niangua River, north- 

 east of Buffalo, Dallas County, Missouri, and Jim Hawk of the Moon Valley 

 farms, were out coon hunting when their dogs treed a housecat at a point four 

 miles from the farm headquarters. When the men came up the housecat seemed 

 to recognize them and descended the tree, purring in a friendly fashion. It 

 proved to be a blue tomcat which headquartered at the house four miles distant. 



This is conclusive proof that the cruising radius of even a non-feral cat may be 

 up to four miles. It seems probable that the radius of feral cats, harder pressed 

 for a living, may be greater. 



CROWS 



Distribution and Migration. Crows are present yearlong in all parts 

 of the north central region except the Forest Belt, which has few or no crows in 

 winter. Thus in Door County, Wisconsin, crows do not winter except in years 

 of beech mast. 



There is a great seasonal difference in abundance, however, in all parts of 

 the region. Thus in southern Wisconsin, crows are most abundant during migra- 

 tion, which occurs in February and March, and in October and November. They 

 are less abundant during the summer, and still less so during mid-winter. 



Farther south, in the central corn belt, crows are most abundant in winter, 

 when the local populations are reinforced by migrants from the north. 



These seasonal shifts are commonly disregarded in considering the control 

 of crows as a predator. It is useless to kill crows in winter or early spring for 

 the purpose of protecting nesting game birds which do not lay eggs until long 

 after a majority of the winter crows have gone north, and until after there has 

 been an entire reshuffling of the crow population. 



Sometimes the crow migration takes place en masse. One day in the spring 

 of 1898 Dr. Lynds Jones saw a great migrating host, numbering hundreds of 

 thousands of crows, flying north near Oberlin, Ohio. When they came to the 

 south shore of Lake Erie, they turned east, evidently seeking some narrower 

 place to cross the lake. 



