Diet of Florida Mice 133 



each trail. Acorns with weevil holes were not used, and in a single 

 trial all acorns either had caps or lacked them. Approximately 12 

 hours later I removed bowls, acorns, and acorn fragments. I recorded 

 whether acorns were removed from bowls and whether they were 

 opened and eaten, opened and evidently not eaten, gnawed, or appar- 

 ently untouched. After discovering that some acorns lacking external 

 holes were spoiled by insects or mold, I simplified analysis of results 

 by recording only whether acorns were opened, regardless of whether 

 any meat appeared to have been removed. Ranked data were subjected 

 to the Friedman test (Conover 1980) to test the null hypothesis that 

 species of acorns were opened in equal numbers. 



Food Supplementation — The food supplementation experiment 

 consisted of trapping at three grids, two on Anderson-Cue (desig- 

 nated ACI and ACII) and one on Smith Lake (SL). Each grid consisted 

 of 10 columns and 10 rows 10-m apart, with a single Sherman trap 

 at each intersection (area = 10,000 m 2 ). Prior trapping at burrows in 

 each area indicated that mice were present, and grids were set more 

 than 100-m apart to reduce movements of animals between grids. In 

 April, May, and June, 1987, I trapped SL for 800 trapnights and 

 determined that after three consecutive nights of trapping, no addi- 

 tional individuals were captured. Consequently, SL, ACI, and ACII 

 were trapped for three consecutive nights per month for a total of 

 300 trapnights/grid monthly. On ACI I provided a mixture of sun- 

 flower seeds, mixed bird seed, and oatmeal for 1 year in seven chick 

 feeders fitted with glass jars. To eliminate non-target species, plastic 

 buckets with two holes (2.5 cm) cut near the rims were upended 

 over the feeders and anchored with cinder blocks. 



RESULTS 



General Observations on Diet — Five feeding events were observed 

 at Smith Lake. An adult male caught and released on SL (5 May 

 1988) readily ate a cricket (Orthoptera: Gryllinae) offered to him. 

 On 15 June 1987 at approximately 0245 EST, an adult female (who 

 had been trapped and released) immediately caught a small moth 

 and consumed all but the wings. On 9 May, an adult female just 

 released from a trap ate a young shoot of wild bamboo (Smilax 

 auriculata). In July 1988, a female released from a trap at a burrow 

 hid in a hole at the base of a turkey oak approximately 5 m 

 northwest of the burrow. In a few minutes she left the hole, picked 

 up a small pawpaw (Asimina incarna), carried it back to the hole, 

 and ate it. Jones (1989) previously described consumption of a pawpaw 

 fruit (A. incarna) by a Florida mouse at Smith Lake. Predation and 

 dispersal of Asimina fruits have not been well studied, although 



