(CNSNews.com) - Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois has surged to a 9-point lead over Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York in the race for the Iowa presidential caucuses, according to a poll released Saturday by the Davenport, Iowa, Quad City Times.

The poll shows Clinton tied for second place with former Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina, with Edwards rising and Clinton declining.

This is a dramatic shift from the results of last month's edition of the same poll, in which Clinton led Obama by 2 points and Edwards ran in third place.

The Iowa caucuses will take place seventeen days from now, on the evening of Thursday, January 3.

The Quad City Times poll was conducted between December 10 and 13. It included telephone interviews with 500 randomly selected likely Democratic caucus voters from precincts all across Iowa. (See complete poll results)

The poll carries a margin of error of plus or minue 4.5 points.

Thirty-three percent of likely Democratic caucus voters in the poll said that if the caucuses were held today they would vote for Obama. Twenty-four percent said they would vote for Edwards, and 24% said they would vote for Clinton. New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson placed a distant fourth, with 9%, down from the 13% support he had in this poll last month.

In November, The Quad City Times poll showed Clinton leading the field with 27%, Obama second with 25%, and Edwards third with 21%.

The new poll released on Saturday showed both Obama and Edward leading Clinton among women voters, with Obama getting 34% from women, Edwards getting 26% and Clinton getting 25%. Among male likely Democratic caucus voters, however, Clinton nudged out Edwards for second place. Obama was supported by 32% of male poll respondents, Clinton by 23%, and Edwards by 22%.

Most of the surveyed voters told the pollsters they had pretty much made up their minds on their caucus vote. Overall, 77% said they are either "not very likely" to change their mind or "not at all likely" to do so.

Sen. Clinton's supporters were the most locked-in, with Obama trailing only slightly in the level of commitment of his supporters. Specifically, 81% of Sen. Clinton's supporters said they were either "not very likely" (46%) or "not at all likely" (35%) to change their minds between now and caucus day.

Seventy-five percent of Obama's supporters said they were either "not very likely" (43%) or "not at all likely" (32%) to change their mind. Seventy-two percent of Edwards voters said they either were "not very likely" (42%) or "not at all likely" (30%) to change their minds.

The economy and health care narrowly beat a U.S. military withdrawal from Iraq as the top issues on the minds of Iowa Democrats. When asked the single most important issue they would like to see the candidates talk more about, 28% said the economy and jobs, 27% said health care and 26% said getting troops out of Iraq.

On Saturday, The Des Moines Register endorsed Sen. Clinton as their candidate in the Democratic caucuses. On Sunday, she started a five-day tour across Iowa dubbed by her campaign "The Every County Counts Tour." Over the five days, Sen. Clinton will personally visit 16 of Iowa's 99 counties, traveling by "Hill-O-Copter." Surrogates, including her husband former President Bill Clinton, will visit the other 83 counties on her behalf.

Last week, television talk show host Oprah Winfrey, who has endorsed Obama, helped Obama draw a total of a 28,500 people to a pair of rallies in Des Moines and Cedar Rapids, Iowa. The Obama campaign said it gathered 20,000 names, addresses and phone numbers from these attendees.

Historically, Democrats have not released the actual vote totals from their Iowa caucuses, reporting only the percentages candidates received. In the 2000 Republican caucuses, however, George W. Bush won with 35,231 votes. In the 1996 caucuses, Bob Dole won with 25,378. (See historical Iowa caucus results.)