3. Factors Inf1uencinq Distribution and Abundance of Pheasants 
Vol . 8, No. 2 
Page 3 
W. L. Anderson 
It was estimated that 239 pheasants were present on the experimental release 
area at Bellmont during the prehunt period (October) in 1964. This estimate was 
based on the principle of the Lincoln Index, whereby pheasants were captured by 
night1ighting during the prehunt period, marked with backtags, and released in the 
fields in which they had been captured. Subsequently, local farmers and sportsmen 
were asked to keep records of the numbers of marked and unmarked birds they saw 
while hunting pheasants on the area. These records provided three known values, 
from which a fourth value (prehunt population) was calculated by using a simple 
ratio formula. 
The sex ratio among all pheasants found and age ratios among cocks and among 
hens captured by night1ighting indicated that the 239 birds included 138 cocks 
(122 juveniles and 16 adults) and 101 hens (73 juveniles and 28 adults). The 
preponderance of cocks in the population was suggestive of differential rates of 
death between the sexes during the summer and early fall of 1964. The estimate of 
28 adult hens in the prehunt population suggested that less than 5 percent of 646 
hen pheasants released on the area in March 1964 survived to the following October. 
4. Responses of Bobwhites to Habitat Manipulation 
J. A. Ellis, R. L. Westemeier 
The 1964 quail harvest, the recovery of marked quail in the kill, and the 
January 1 965 posthunt censuses provided population estimates for the Dale and 
Forbes areas (Table 3). The prehunt population estimates based on one or on two 
of these three sets of data were believed to be more realistic than the estimates 
derived from the November 1964 prehunt censuses (Monthly Wildlife Research Letter, 
January, 1965). A prehunt population estimate of 620‘il33 quail was obtained for 
the Forbes Area, based on the recovery of tagged quail during the hunting season. 
The recorded kill plus the results of the posthunt census produced an estimate of 
400 quail in the prehunt population on Forbes. If these were maximum and minimum 
estimates, it seems reasonable to conclude that the 1964 prehunt population on 
Forbes was approximately 500 birds. Thus, densities of the prehunt population on 
the Forbes Area, expressed as quail per 100 acres, were similar in 1 963 and 1964 
(Table 3)• 
On the Dale Area, prehunt population densities were similar in 1964 and 1963, 
according to the estimates based on the recorded harvests plus the results from the 
posthunt censuses (Table 3). The proportion of marked birds in the kill during the 
I 963 and 1964 hunting seasons produced unrealistic estimates of the prehunt popu¬ 
lations on the Dale Area, and are not given in Table 3. 
From the harvest data for Forbes in 1964, it was possible to estimate the number 
of adult males on the area during the breeding season. Data obtained by using the 
number of marked and unmarked adult cocks in the harvest and the number of adult 
cocks marked from mid-May to mid-July produced an estimate of 139i^ 7 cocks on the 
Forbes Area during the breeding season. Only 117 quail (both sexes) were found on 
Forbes during the prebreeding census in March 1964. The difference between the 
