traps was transported into the nearest harborage 
box whether or not it was immediately eaten. 
However, the actual count of Purina checkers 
in the harborage boxes (see table 18) indicates a 
much greater number in those boxes lying farther 
away from the passages through the barrier fence 
than would be anticipated on the basis of the 
above behavior of deposition in the nearest shelter 
or harborage. The explanation of this lies in 
the fact that once a food cache is formed it may 
serve as a secondary source of food which will 
then be transported to other places. In this way 
the food becomes rather generally distributed 
through the environment in all available harborage 
sites, irrespective of whether the harborages were 
being utilized by the rats as place of retreat during 
their inactive periods. The independence of the 
usage of harborage sites for food storage from then- 
usage as a place of retreat is revealed in table 19 
which was derived from several inspections of 
the harborage boxes. 
Table 19. — The independence of the place of termi- 
nating a food storage trip from the place of habitation 
Rats or nests 
in harborage 
box 
Food in boxes 
Present 
Absent 
Present 
76 
66 
Absent 
170 
166 
The Chi square for this distribution is 0.2350 which has 
a probability of chance occurrence between .5 and .7 
Up to this point we have reached the general 
conclusions that (1) there is a tendency to deposit 
food in the nearest harborage shelter, and that (2) 
both initial and subsequent transfers of food are 
made irrespective of the use of harborages as places 
of retreat during times when the rats are inactive. 
This food dispersal through the environment was 
an important aspect of the life of the rats. It made 
the food, which was originally available only in the 
center of the Food Pen, rather generally available 
over the whole pen. This must have reduced con- 
siderably the frequency of conflicts which would 
otherwise have arisen at the single source of food. 
Although one rat may remove the food from the 
cache formed by another rat near this rat’s place 
of harborage, one probably is not justified in desig- 
nating this behavior as “stealing”. Practically all 
the evidence points to the fact that there is a com- 
plete unawareness of property rights or value of the 
food object (see p. 108). 
The following are a few examples of the events 
which transpire during the social dispersal of food : 
1. April 20, 1949, 1:45 a.m. At the South Alley 
Burrow a rat entered and departed from a 
burrow entrance with a piece of garbage just 
taken in by another rat, and carried it into 
another nearby entrance. 
2. May 9, 1947. A rat took a piece of garbage 
from the Food Pen into Box 28. Just after it 
left another rat entered and took it to Box 19. 
3. May 18, 1947. Garbage had been placed 
near the food hopper. Between 6:33 and 6:45 
p.m. a male rat made seven trips taking gar- 
bage through Passage 7 into the North Alley 
where he formed two food caches; four trips 
into a clump of shrubs, and three trips into an 
unset trap just outside Passage 7. Between 
6:45 and 6:50 another male rat took the food 
from the cache among the shrubs and trans- 
ported it down Path 3 over to and into a bur- 
row beside the outside fence opposite Box 19. 
While he was doing this, the first rat took the 
food from the cache he had formed in the open 
trap and transported it down into the North 
Alley Burrow. Between 6:50 and 6:55 p.m. 
the second male made two trips taking some of 
the crumbled garbage from the open trap over 
into its burrow opposite Box 19 and then he 
made two trips carrying food from the Food 
Pen to his burrow. At 7:10 p.m. two other 
rats from somewhere in Area III entered this 
burrow and took food past Box 20 to a point 
that I could not see. 
4. January 21, 1948. A rat carried food from 
the Food Pen into hole 9 of the South Alley 
burrow. One of three rats standing nearby 
immediately followed and, without going in 
far enough for me to loose sight of its tail, it 
backed out with the food. 
5. March 4, 1948, 6:50 to 7 p.m. Several rats 
have made trips from the Food Pen carrying 
carrying food into hole 3 of the South Alley 
Burrow. A rat coming from Passage 1 went 
down this hole, took some food and ran back 
through Passage 1 into either Area I or IV. 
6. May 24, 1948. One rat took a piece of bread 
through Passage 8 of the Food Pen and left 
it just outside in the West Alley. Another 
rat took it out among a clump of small trees 
104 
