Seed hoarding by rodents of the Monte desert, Argentina

GIANNONI STELLA; DACAR, M; TARABORELLI, P.; BORGHI CARLOS

AUSTRAL ECOLOGY

Lugar: Australia; Año: 2001 vol. 26 p. 259 - 263

1442-9985

Food storage is an important adaptation of several animal species to the temporally variable or unpredictablefood supplies that are typical of desert environments. In the present study, whether Eligmodontia typus andGraomys griseoflavus inhabiting sand dunes in the Monte desert displayed scatter-hoarding was investigated. Bothrodent species prepared surface caches by digging small holes (1–3#cm deep) in the soil. Caches were partiallycovered with sand and dry leaves, which meant that all of the cache sites at each station could be found. Mostcaches were found below shrubs, that is, in a sheltered microhabitat rather than near the food source. The meandistance between caches and seed sources was significantly higher than the mean distance from food sources toshrubs. The proportion of caches was significantly higher in shrubs with high safety cover. The adaptive significanceof this foraging behaviour could be a competitive tactic for the rapid sequestering of food from a rich andephemeral source. Such behaviour would reflect predation risk, which constitutes an important foraging cost indeserts, and could also influence plant community dynamics.