MONTHLY WILDLIFE RESEARCH LETTER Vol. 1, No. 12 
Page 2 
W-55-R-3 F. Bellrose 
Three aerial surveys (December 5_, 11 and 18) were made of waterfowl 
populations in the Illinois and Mississippi River valleys. A flight of ducks 
on December 2 did not materially alter waterfowl populations in Illinois because 
there was as great an exodus as ingress. However, it did result in a greater 
concentration of ducks in the Mississippi River valley and a reduction in the 
number of ducks in the Illinois River valley. Since early December the duck 
populations in Illinois have remained quite stable with about 1*00,000 mallards 
in the Mississippi River valley and 330,000 in the Illinois River valley. 
W-56-R-3 G. Sanderson 
Unseasonably cold weather during much of December sharply curtailed 
the hunting and trapping of raccoons and thus reduced the harvest from that 
normally expected at this time of year. Low prices received for raccoon and 
other furs did little to stimulate fur-taking. For these reasons, only three 
additional marked raccoons were received from the Piatt County study area during 
December. This brings the total number of marked raccoons received to 17, of 
which 3 were marked in 1957 and ll* in 1958. 
During the 1957-58 season, nearly 20 per cent of the 56 marked raccoons 
on the area were taken by hunters and trappers. The 3 raccoons marked, in 1957 
but not killed until the 1958-59 season now make it possible to account for 25 
per cent of the raccoons marked in 1957. The li* marked raccoons which were 
killed thus far in the 1958-59 season represent approximately ll* per cent of those 
marked on the area in 1958. 
During December, 136 raccoons were examined at fur establishments in 
Fulton, Piatt and McDonough Counties. Of these, 59 (a little more than 1*3 per 
cent) were females. In November, nearly 52 per cent of the raccoons examined 
were females. This follows the expected pattern of raccoon harvest with the 
cold weather apparently curtailing the activity of females to a greater extent 
than that of males. 
W-61-R-2 F. Greeley, J. Ellis 
The food contents of pheasant crops and gizzards collected on three 
study areas during the hunting season were extracted, labeled and stored. Over 
120 crops and gizzards were processed. They are to be used for food habits 
studies and for analysis of types of grit used by pheasants. 
A paper, "Status of Two Attempts to Establish Pheasants in Vacant 
Habitat in Illinois," was presented at the Midwest Wildlife Conference at Columbus, 
Ohio. The paper was a summary of 2 years of study of the two populations of 
