Journal of the Southeastern Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies

Law Enforcement is a difficult job, one that likely involves more different types of work than we find in any other department of our organization. At the top of his many duties,the Conservation Officer must be an official representative for the entire department's program in his assigned area. Since he must excel in good public relations in his own community, he must also have the ability (if given the opportunity) to help promote good relations throughout the whole organization. This is often difficult to do when he is considered by other departments as "just a Conservation Officer." In order to command its due respect the Law Enforcement must upgrade itself as to education, training and personal characteristics. On the other hand, the abilities and accomplishments of the Law Enforcement Officer must be recognized by the Director, the Commissioners, the Fishery, the Game and Educational Departments.

This paper describes methods and reasons for chemically analyzing selected plant tissue and discusses procedures for processing pl:ant samples so that the results will be meaningful in deer food and habitat evaluation studies.

Fall quail population censuses were conducted on a 257.6~acre study area of the Auburn University Agricultural Experiment Station extending over a period of 23 years. Spring quail censuses were conducted for 15 years. In 1940 the land had just been retired from intensive corn and cotton cultivation, and the quail population was very low (5.0 birds per 100 acres). In 1944 the fall quail population reached 40.8 birds per 100 acres and it was about the same in 1945. By 1944 abandoned cropland on the area had reached a stage very favorable to quail, and some wildlife plantings made in 1942 were producing seed. In 1950 the area was divided for study into two parts: (1) a burn-area covering 124.2 acres, and (2) a check-area covering 133.4 acres. During a six-year period (1950-55) when approximately one-fourth of the burn-area was burned each year in late winter, the fall quail population averaged about the same as the check-area.

A study designed to determine the vegetative composition and production of that portion of Apalachee Bay, Florida, ,included within the St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge was carried out in 1964. Gizzards and gullets of fourteen diving ducks were subsequently collected in order to correlate feeding activities with available foods. Greater scaup consumed large quantities of animal foods. Redheads consumed considerably more vegetative material than animal, and showed a predilection for shoalgrass. Shoalgrass contribituted 67.9 per cent of the total volume of all foods consumed by diving ducks. Turtlegrass and manateegrass, two other species which occur commonly in the bay, apparently are of little value as waterfowl foods in this area.

Five deer census methods are compared on the Central Peninsula deer herd in Eastern Tennessee. This insular herd is intensively managed and has several characteristics which make it worthy of population analysis. All census methods indicated similar population trends and differed only in magnitude. The Lincoln Index and Percent Kill Methods provided the most reliable estimates. The latter is the easiest to calculate. The Sex-age Kill Method will apparently give good herd estimates, if the percent of non-hunting losses can be approximated and allowance made for other problems. It shows promise of greater accuracy when existing biases and unknowns can be omitted. For the present time the Percent Kill Method seems to be the most practical for use on the typical management area in Tennessee. Identification of accurate and practical deer census methods continues to challenge herd managers in most of North America.

Preliminary data suggest that the fat content of the soft tissue in the cavity under the grinding teeth of the mandible might be a useful indicator of condition in deer. Seven physical characteristics were measured on 85 deer. Statistical treatment of these data suggest a strong relationship between the fat content of the mandibular cavity tissue and the condition of the deer. Three of the five best correlations were between mandibular cavity tissue fat and other characteristics related to condition. Simple means of mandibular cavity tissue fat separated out three condition classes of deer effectively. Further research on the subject is suggested.

Movements and homing instinct of transplanted European wild boar were studied on adjacent wildlife management areas in western North Carolina and eastern Tennessee over a six-year period (1960-1965). Ninety-one wild boars were live-trapped within the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, transferred to the game department representing the state within which they were captured, ear-tagged for subsequent identification, and released at distances ranging from 13 to 27 airline miles from the point of capture. Movements information was derived by (1) recovering tags and pertinent kill data from hunters, (2) retrapping, and (3) locating dead animals. Hunters reported tags from 26 (28.5 percent) of the transplanted wild boars during the study period. Hunter-killed boars had traveled airline distances of from one-half mile to approximately 14 miles from the release site and were killed at time intervals ranging from one day to over three years following the release date.

Wild sows are physiologically capable of farrowing during any season of the year. However, there are two main farrowing periods; mid-winter (January and February) and early summer (May and June). To determine the importance of the different farrowing periods and the most appropriate time to subject the species to hunting pressure, the year was divided into three periods: December-March, April-July, and August-November. Based on the percentage of sows killed on managed hunts which were pregnant, the December-March period has the highest natality and litters are larger during this same period. The April-July period is when hunting would be most damaging to herd productivity because most of the adult sows are either pregnant or suckling, and death of the sows means death to the fetuses or dependent pigs. Most of the hogs killed during the managed hunts were born in the April-July period, indicating higher mortality among winter born hogs.