stomach or dropping analyses were made. In many areas the digging 
of one species of rhizome would necessarily result in uncovering 
and removing another species. Saltmeadow cordgrass, present over 
much of the marsh, was often found together with other species 
in a digging. By comparing the proportion of diggings or clippings 
involving a plant species with the estimated proportion of that 
species in the vegetation, some insight may be gained into the 
food habits of the nutria. 
Tables IX, X, and XI present these comparisons for Transects A, 
B, and C. The presence of each species in the vegetation was estima- 
ted from the sample transects. In pure stand, a species was given 
the total inches along which it occurred. If dominant over another 
species, it was arbitrarily accorded two-thirds of the recorded 
inches; the remaining one-third was assigned to the subordinate 
species, or divided equally among them if more than one subordinate 
species was present. Total inches of a species was taken as a per- 
centage of the total inches of vegetation. ILIikewise, the presence 
of plant fragments of each species in a nutria digging or clipping 
was recorded, and the total for the plant species was taken as a 
percentage of the total diggings and cliprings, thus obtaining a 
percentage occurrence. Occasional plant species that did not 
occur on the transect appear in the tables because the samples of 
diggings were often not taken directly along the line of the tran- 
sect, but always close to it. 
18 
