Natural History Survey, Urbana, Illinois). Don Christison estimated 

 that the Mississippi River bottoms of Pools 24, 25, and 26 would support 

 one or two squirrels per acre depending on maturity and species compo- 

 sition of the bottomland forest (personal communication, January 16, 

 1978, Missouri Department of Conservation). A population average of 

 one squirrel per acre is considered a normal fall density. It should 

 be noted that the addition of forest acreage, which was a result of 

 black willows pioneering newly formed mud flats as a result of increased 

 sedimentation, provides little additional habitat. Black willows are 

 of minimal importance to squirrels and provide neither food nor nesting 

 sites. 



The nine-foot channel project had an adverse effect on squirrel 

 population by the destruction of habitat through inundation and clearing 

 of bottomland forest. Also, as a result of this loss of timber and 

 the creation of more edge habitat, the species composition changed from 

 proportionally more grey squirrels to proportionally more fox squirrels, 

 as was noted at Calhoun Point (Yeager, 1949: 61). 



Rabbits 



The cottontail rabbit is ubiquitous throughout Illinois and Missouri, 

 Hoffmeister and Mohr indicate that the rabbit is found along fencerows 

 and margins of wood lots, forest edges, and dry bottomlands (1972: 194). 

 The high, semi-dry bottomlands of the Mississippi valley provided 

 habitat for the cottontail before the implementation of the nine-foot 

 channel. Many of these areas have now been inundated by the nine-foot 

 project and have limited populations of rabbits in the bottomland (Green, 

 1960: 4). Yeager (1949: 61) indicated that rabbits were notably scarce 

 on Calhoun Point even before inundation, a result of the very low, wet 

 nature of the bottomland. 



Quantitative population figures are not available for cottontail 

 rabbits in the Mississippi and Illinois River bottomland. Removal of 

 bottomland timber and subsequent inundation would have had an adverse 

 effect on cottontail rabbit populations in the Illinois and Mississippi 

 River bottoms. 



187 



