Mass to Girth 9 7 



The assumption for using a mass to girth ratio as a measure of physical 

 condition was: the greater the amount of fat the better the physical condition of 

 a raccoon. This assumption is based on the manner in which subcutaneous fat is 

 accumulated in raccoons (see Stuewer 1943). Body fat and kidney fat indices 

 have shown some correlation of the amount of fat to physical condition for the 

 species (Johnson 1970, Dunn and Chapman 1983). 



My findings indicate that the mass to girth ratio was not indicative of 

 physical condition in raccoons for several reasons. No difference in slope or 

 intercept existed between any groupings for the equation relating mass to girth. 

 Although a difference existed among age classes and between sexes, this differ- 

 ence can be explained by reasons other than physical condition. Further evi- 

 dence of the shortcoming of the mass to girth ratio as an indicator of physical 

 condition was the lack of any consistent relationship between the two variables 

 when the relationship was tested for each individual. All individuals appeared to 

 be in good condition when captured, and differences in the ratio probably only 

 reflect individual variation and might not be indicative of physical condition. 



Thus, I concluded that the mass to girth ratio was not a good indicator 

 of physical condition. Nevertheless, because of need for determining physical 

 condition during long-term population and community ecology studies, there 

 remains a necessity to determine physical condition through nonintrusive meth- 

 ods. 



ACKNOWLEDGMENTS - I thank Michael L. Kennedy and Timothy M. Stew- 

 ard for their aid in collecting data, and Mark E. Ritke for supplying rainfall data 

 for 1991 and 1992. I thank John R. Ouellette and the anonymous reviewers for 

 their constructive criticism. 



LITERATURE CITED 



Barash, D. P. 1974. Neighbor recognition in two "solitary" carnivores: the rac- 

 coon (Procyon lotor) and the red fox (Vulpesfulva). Science 185:794-796. 



Bissonette, T. H., and A. G. Csech. 1938. Sexual photoperiodicity of rac- 

 coons on low protein diet and second litters in the same breeding season. 

 Journal of Mammalogy 19:342-348. 



Braun, E. L. 1950. Deciduous forests of eastern North America. The Blakiston 

 Company, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. 



Castellini, M. A., and G. L. Kooyman. 1990. Length, girth and mass relation- 

 ships in weddell seals (Leptonychotes weddellii). Marine Mammal Science 

 6:75-77. 



Dunn, J. P., and J. A. Chapman. 1983. Reproduction, physiological responses, 

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