Welcome to the clearing house for information on the Illinois conservation
status of Franklin's ground squirrel (Spermophilus franklinii). How
current and useful the page is depends on how well YOU keep it updated by
sending me (Oliver
Pergams)
information.
For my part, I promise to put up any information I'm sent as soon as I
can. The most recently updated items will be in bold font.There are
three sections:
Feb. 20, 2004 The Illinois Endangered Species Protection Board voted to list Franklin's ground squirrel as Threatened in Illinois. Threatened status offers the same protection as Endangered. The Board said they hoped this listing would encourage further research. To all of you who have worked hard for this, congratulations: FGS is now protected in Illinois.
Summer, 2000. There is a population of FGS reported living in the Game Farm at the Des Plaines State Conservation Area.
Fall, 2002. After locating potential sites through an extensive email survey of state biologists and managers, Jason Martin of UIUC captured FGS in Illinois at only 3/26 sites, located within 2/11 areas. Eleven were captured at the Barnhart Grove Prairie Restoration two miles south of Urbana. There were 23 FGS caught at two sites in Vermilion County situated app. three km apart along an active railroad right-of-way, east of Hoopeston. The population at the Game Farm at the Des Plaines State Conservation Area was found to have been extirpated, possibly as a result of accidentally poisoning with rat poison.
Here is a map of local FGS range adapted from Hoffmeister (1989).
As
you see, Indiana and Missouri have listed FGS as "Endangered," Wisconsin
has listed FGS as a "Species of Special Concern," and Iowa has listed FGS
as "Rare." Illinois has so far not listed FGS in any way.
Here are news items:
Dec. 17, 1999. Nominated for endangered or threatened species status by Dennis Nyberg and Oliver Pergams of UIC. Rejected Feb. 29, 2000 for lack of sufficient evidence.
July 6, 2000. Eric Yensen of Albertson College and Paul Sherman are writing a paper on the conservation and population status of some of the western ground squirrels, and will also refer to the situation of other related species (such as FGS) in order to draw attention to there being a widespread conservation problem.
September, 2000. Joyce Hoffmann and Ed Heske of INHS receive a grant from the Illinois Endangered Species Protection Board to do a status survey of FGS throughout its range in the state. Graduate student Jason Martin is working with Ed as part of his M.S. thesis research.
December 18, 2000. Jeff Huebschman, now faculty at the University of Wisconsin in Platteville, studied FGS as part of his dissertation at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln. Since FGS is reported to be experiencing population declines throughout its US range, Jeff is asking if FGS is becoming genetically depauparate as a result of fragmentation, reduced gene flow, and increased inbreeding.
May 31, 2001. In response to a request from the World Conservation Union (IUCN), Dennis Nyberg and Oliver Pergams of UIC have prepared and submitted a FGS Species Plan for possible inclusion in the next update of the Status Survey and Conservation Action Plan for North American Rodents.
September 28, 2001. There was an initial meeting of the Chicago Wilderness FGS Conservation Task Force. Representatives from Brookfield Zoo, Cook County, Illinois DNR, Lake County, McHenry County, and UIC attended. The meeting was encouraging and interest in promoting Chicago area FGS conservation was unanimous.
October 6, 2001. Oliver
Pergams gives a talk on "Global Conservation Status of Franklin's ground
squirrel (Spermophilus franklinii)" at the Natural Areas
Association meeting in Florida.
THE SLIDE SHOW MAY BE FOUND HERE.
November
6,
2001. In September
Oliver Pergams contacted
Ron Refsnider, Listing Specialist for Region 3 of the U.S. Fish and
Wildlife Service, to talk about FGS and the federal listing process. Ron
said USFW would discuss the possibility of FGS becoming a Candidate
Species at a meeting in October. Ron now reports that FGS will not become
a Candidate Species at this time because of insufficient survey
information. However, Ron also says a USFW Region 3 Species of Concern
Task Force will prioritize species to fund further surveys. FGS is
automatically one of these SOC because of its listed status in three U.S.
states.
November 7, 2001. Jeff Huebschman reports the following about his Illinois trapping this past summer:
"My trapping this summer was very brief. Basically I concentrated on picking up some locations in the southeast part of their range. I only spent about 36 hours in Illinois, and let Jason Martin do the surveying for me there. In my brief time, I did not catch any squirrels (though I would take that with a grain of salt, as I don't consider the trapping I do to be surveying.) However, of note, the population at Des Plaines seems to be reduced--possibly as a result of a rat poisoning scheme. Neither Jason nor I picked up squirrels there. However, I would put money on it that there are still squirrels in the area--too much potential habitat to examine and not enough time."
BE November 7, 2001. Jason Martin of the University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign reports a wealth of information about both his Illinois trapping this past summer and a FGS mail survey of Illinois biologists and conservation professionals that he conducted:
"Out of the 166 mail surveys that we sent out we received 77 responses, only 9 of which reported any knowledge of extant FGS populations (referring to a total of 11 populations in all). When asked about potential populations, 22 of the respondents made reference to 44 possible populations based on unconfirmed sightings coupled with the existence of historical records and/or the occurrence of appropriate habitat. 8 people knew of extirpated populations and 45 thought that FGS were not present in their region of the state at all.
Survey recipients were asked to report any discernible population trends in Franklin's ground squirrel populations with which they were familiar. There were no reports of populations that are currently increasing in size and only three reports of stable populations. Ten people expressed concern that S. franklinii is in a state of decline in their region of Illinois. The vast majority of the respondents, 63, did not feel sufficiently familiar with the species or its local distribution to form an opinion about its current status. This points to a critical lack of information and the need for further study.
When asked to explain the cause of the theoretical decline of the Franklin''s ground squirrel in Illinois, ten respondents attributed the possible trend to loss of suitable habitat. Two respondents referred to habitat fragmentation and one postulated an increase in predation by habitat edge occupying predators.
We conducted a live-trapping survey to test the reliability of the mail survey reports and to obtain a general sense of the persistence of historical populations. 10 areas were chosen for trapping across FGS's historical range based on the mail survey results. Most of these broad areas contained multiple trapping sites. In all, 24 sites were trapped. Of these 24 sites, FGS were only caught at 3, two of which were about a mile apart along the same stretch of railroad and therefore were probably part of the same population. The sites were located in Champaign and Vermilion Counties. 11 adults were captured at the Champaign County site (trapped 29 May-1 June 2001) and 23 squirrels (18 juveniles and 5 adults) were trapped at the Vermilion sites (trapped 9-12 July 2001)."
January 22, 2003.The final IUCN Species Action Plan is approved by the World Conservation Union. FGS now has a global rating of "Vulnerable," and will be so designated in the 2003 IUCN Red List.
November 18, 2003. The 2003 IUCN Red List is published with FGS listed as globally 'Vulnerable'.
Feb. 3, 2004. Inexplicably, FGS is left off the preliminary Illinois 2004 Endangered Species List. Illinois is one of the states where FGS is most endangered. To read Oliver Pergams' testimony before the Illinois Endangered Species Protection Board click HERE. The final decision will be made Feb. 20, 2004.
Bailey, V. 1893. The prairie ground squirrels or Spermophiles of the Mississippi Valley. U. S. Dept. of Agriculture, Div. of Ornithology and Mammalogy, Bulletin No. 4, Washington, Distict of Columbia.
Sowls, L. K. 1948. The Franklin's ground squirrel and its relationship to nesting ducks. Journal of Mammalogy 29:113-137.
Polder, E. 1967. Vertebrate coactions with the Franklin's ground squirrel. Pp. 179-185 in "Proceedings of the Iowa Academy of Science for 1965," State of Iowa, Des Moines.
van Petten, A. and P. Schramm. 1972. Introduction, dispersal, and population increase of the franklin's ground squirrel, Spermophilus franklinii, in a restored prairie. Proceedings of the Second Midwest Prairie Conference 166-173.
Krohne, D. T., J. Hauffe, and P. Schramm. 1972. Radio-tracking the Franklin's ground squirrel in a restored prairie. Proceedings of the Third Midwest Prairie Conference 84-88.
Haberman, C. G. and E. D. Fleharty. 1972. Natural history notes on Franklin's ground squirrel in Boone County, Nebraska. Transactions of the Kansas Academy of Science 74:76-80.
Iverson, S. L. and B. N. Turner. 1972. Natural history of a Manitoba population of Franklin's ground squirrels. Canadian Field-Naturalist 86:145-149.
Murie, J. 1973. Population characteristics and phenology of a Franklin ground squirrel (Spermophilus franklinii) colony in Alberta, Canada. American Midland Naturalist 90: 334-340.
Ellis, L. S. 1982. Life History studies of Franklin's ground squirrel, Spermophilus franklinii, in Missouri. Report to Missouri DNR, Northeast Missouri State University, Kirksville.
Brack, V. 1983. Current status of the Franklin's ground squirrel (Spermophilus franklinii) in Indiana. Report dated 8/83 to Indiana DNR, no affiliation.
Choromanski-Norris, J. F. and E. K. Fritzell. 1983. Status and distribution of ten Missouri mammals. Report dated 11/15/83 to Missouri DNR, University of Missouri, Columbia.
Ellis, L. S. 1984. Small mammal studies in northeast Missouri: use of railroad rights-of-way and survey of ten sites. Report dated 6/11/84 to Missouri DNR, Northeast Missouri State University, Kirksville.
Panzer, R. 1986. Franklin's ground squirrel translocated to an Illinois prairie preserve. Restoration and Management Notes 4:27.
Johnson, S. 1988. Status and distribution of the Franklin's ground squirrel. Indiana Dept. of Natural Resources Wildlife and Research Notes 407.
Lewis, T. L. 1988. Distribution and population dynamics of the Franklin's ground squirrel. M.S. thesis, University of Wisconsin, Madison.
Benjamin,
P. M.
1991. The ecology
of the Franklin's ground squirrel in Indiana. M.S. thesis, Indiana State
University, Terre Haute, Indiana.
Lewis, T. L. and O. J. Rongstad. 1992. The distribution of Franklin's ground squirrel in Wisconsin and Illinois. Transactions of the Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts, and Letters 80:57-62.
Johnson, S. A. and J. Choromanski-Norris. 1992. Reductions in the eastern limit of the range of the Franklin's ground squirrel (Spermophilus franklinii). American Midlands Naturalist 128:325-331.
Lotter, D. M. 1994. Distribution of the Franklin's ground squirrel (Spermophilus franklinii) in Indiana. Report for the Dept. of Forestry and Natural Resources, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana.
Bowles, J. B., D. L. Howell, R. P. Lampe, and H. P. Whidden. 1998. Mammals of Iowa: Holocene to the end of the 20th century. Journal of the Iowa Academy of Science 105:123-132.
Anthony, N. M. 1999. The Wisconsin Small Mammal Survey: a volunteer-based small mammal survey program for native grassland preserves in southern Wisconsin. M. S. thesis, University of Wisconsin, Madison.
Martin, J. M., E. J. Heske, and J. E. Hofmann. 2002. A status survey of the Franklin’s ground squirrel (Spermophilus franklinii) in Illinois. Center for Biodiversity Technical Report 2002(18), Illinois Natural History Survey, Champaign, IL.
Martin, J. M., E. J. Heske, and J. E. Hofmann. 2003. Franklin's ground squirrel (Spermophilus franklinii) in Illinois: a declining prairie mammal? American Midland Naturalist 150:130-138.
Heubschman, J. J. 2003. A conservation assessment of Franklin's ground squirrel (Spermophilus franklinii Sabine 1822): Input from natural history, morphology, and genetics. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Nebraska, Lincoln.
Ostroff, A. C. and E. F. Finck. 2003. Spermophilus franklinii. Mammalian Species 724:1-5.
This page was last updated on Feb. 20, 2004.
