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Article II. — A Study of the Food of Moles in Illinois. By 

 Jamks a. West. 



The moles which furnished the basis for this discussion were in 

 part specimens collected in central Illinois at various times, whose 

 stomachs had been preserved wath the material of the State Labora- 

 tory of Natural History wdthout definite data as to the special situa- 

 tion in which the moles were found, but chiefl^y specimens recently 

 collected, nearly all trapped in 1907 and 1908 by Mr. F. E. Wood, 

 assistant in the State Laboratory of Natural History. 



In April, 1907, special interest in the subject of the feeding- habits 

 of the mole was stimulated by a letter from C. A. Rowe, of Jackson- 

 ville, Illinois, to Dr. S. A. Forbes, Director of the State Laboratoiy, 

 under w'hose direction this investigation was undertaken. Mr. Rowe 

 reported that moles had been very abundant in that locality for sev- 

 eral seasons, and that they had been seriously destructive to seed-corn 

 in recently planted fields. His letter was accompanied by the contents 

 of a mole's stomach, which proved to be about 65 per cent. corn. 



On account of the subterranean life of the mole its feeding" habits 

 are but little known. In captivity it is a voracious feeder, incapable 

 of enduring- any considerable period of starvation. The only accurate 

 way, however, of determining the character of its natural food is to 

 examine the material which it has actually eaten. 



METHOD OE EXAMINATION 



In studying the food of the mole we must examine and classify 

 in detail the entire stomach contents of each specimen, and must esti- 

 mate the amount of each of the food materials, taking* account also 

 of any undetermined residue. For this purpose sheets of filter-paper, 

 twenty by twenty inches, were ruled into one-inch squares and placed 

 on a sheet of glass. A stomach was then opened and the contents, 

 put into a dish with alcohol, were broken up by agitation and thrown 

 upon the filter-paper in a w-ay to distribute the particles of food well 

 over it. The material on each scjuare was then examined and esti- 

 mated separately. If the entire stomach content, or the greater part 

 of it, was composed of one material — earthwonns, for example — it 

 was often possible to determine its character by simple inspection. 



