tiie AU DU BION BULLE TUN 
The Current Status of Certain Bird Species 
In Southern Illinois 
by WILLIAM G. GEORGE 
Depariment of Zoology, Southern Illinois University 
ite a rich and teeming bird fauna and a splendid legacy in ornithology 
| Robert Ridgway, the deep southern counties of Illinois are the present 
its of very few serious birders. Why, I do not know. It is probably rele- 
nevertheless to recall the extinction of the Southern Illinois Bird 
. Once active in and around Jackson County, this group ceased its 
ities some years past. No organization has since existed south of Olney 
lvise and train young observers, pass on old lore and collect new in- 
ation. As a natural consequence, the southern counties today constitute 
of the least-reported localities in the middlewestern prairie region. 
lwo lists exist for the area but neither is generally available: (1) “Check 
of Birds of Southern Illinois” by the Southern Illinois Bird Club, 1952: 
r Esther Bennett, and (2) “Check List of Birds of Southern Illinois, 
by the present author. Copies of the 1952 list have long been scarce, 
> copies of the 1968 list were distributed almost solely to members of 
Nilson Ornithological Society during the Society’s Fifty-ninth Annual 
ing held May, 1968, in Carbondale. 
\ecordingly it seems worthwhile to include below not only observa- 
which I have not presented elsewhere, but certain information from 
968 jist. 
aw-whet Owl, Aegolius acadicus: Unrecorded, which is noteworthy 
2w of the breeding birds in Central Illinois and the far wandering of 
ints. Casual visitants may be expected and for several seasons we 
conducted a saw-whet search, employing a technique by which workers 
here have turned up specimens in surprising places: night-netting at 
dge of fields. Our negative findings should only encourage others to 
n the effort to widen the search throughout the area. 
Town Creeper, Certhia familiaris: May be a rare summer resident, not 
y a winter resident and migrant as currently listed. In August, 1968, 
vily molting young female was secured in hemlocks near Cobden, 
| Co. The specimen evidently stemmed from loca] breeding birds, as 
ted by the date (early migrants appear in October) and condition of 
umage (birds typically complete the post-juvenal molt before migra- 
Woodlands near water perhaps comprise the breeding locality, for in 
nd 1898 Otto Widman found several] nests in cypress swamps in south- 
n Missouri (fide Pickering, 1937). ; 
hiladelphia Vireo, Vireo philadelphicus: Ridgway (1889:36) saw this 
sat Mt. Carmel, Wabash Co., in spring; yet neither Bennett (1952) 
nith and Parmalee (1955) listed it for Southern Illinois; described by 
@ (1968 a) as a rare or uncommon spring mgirant on the basis of 
ay’s observations and three records between 1961-1966. In 1968, six 
en mid-April birds were counted near Cobden, Union Co., where on 
tember the first fall record was established. In Jackson CG.) Pat 
saw One in October. Since Anderson and Bauer (1968) report both 
nber and early October occurrences in the St. Louis area, and Menge] 
384) says of autumn birds in Kentucky “seemingly somewhat more 
aid 
a ne 
