FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   38   39   40   41   42   43   44   45   46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   55   >>  
6 by 8 inches to 8 by 10 inches. The nest is composed of finer, softer, and more chaffy material than the regular storage. The chaff refuse from the food probably contributes largely to it, though some leaves of grasses not stored for food may also be found, and a nest, especially the one in use, may be distinguished, if excavating is carefully done, by the distinct cavity about the size of a fist in its interior (Pl. IX, Fig. 1). One may sometimes find this cavity distinctly warm from the recent presence of the inhabitant. The walls or partitions between the chambers and tunnels are in places surprisingly thin, and it is no wonder that one is almost certain to break through in stepping on a mound, since the whole is a honeycomblike structure of from two to four stories in vertical plan, as shown by the transect of a mound in Plate VII, Figure 1. As Bailey writes, these partition walls are a mixture of earth and old food and nest material discarded years ago, resembling the adobe walls of the Mexican houses built of chopped earth and straw. This is the result of the continual ejection of refuse and earth as before mentioned, combined with the caving action of rains and disturbances from larger animals. Apparently there are no special pockets for deposit of feces in _Dipodomys_ burrows; such matter may be found throughout the den, and is more or less mixed with the food refuse which carpets practically the entire tunnel system. The nest and food stores are, however, clean and neat, the droppings being dry and, though present on the floor of a storage chamber, not actually mingled with the food. Evidently the animal does not clean up the floor litter before storing food material. The entire system for any one den seems to consist not only of the burrows within the mound itself, as described, but of those small outlying ones which we have referred to as subsidiary burrows. These are two to four in number, and are connected with the main mound by the runways already mentioned. They often seem to be way stations on the runways connecting main mounds, and there is seldom any mound of earth whatever in connection with them. One entire den system, the home mound and three subsidiaries, was mapped after being excavated (Fig. 3), all having been carefully gassed with carbon bisulphide. The subsidiaries were simple and contained no storage. Two of them were shallow, while in the third a depth of 48 centimeters was reached. The
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   38   39   40   41   42   43   44   45   46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   55   >>  



Top keywords:

entire

 

system

 

refuse

 

storage

 

material

 

burrows

 
carefully
 

subsidiaries

 

cavity

 
runways

inches

 

mentioned

 

storing

 

litter

 
mingled
 

consist

 
animal
 

Evidently

 

tunnel

 

special


matter
 

Dipodomys

 

pockets

 

deposit

 

carpets

 
droppings
 

present

 

practically

 

stores

 

chamber


gassed

 

excavated

 

mapped

 

carbon

 

bisulphide

 
centimeters
 

reached

 
simple
 

contained

 

shallow


connection

 
referred
 

outlying

 

subsidiary

 

stations

 

connecting

 
mounds
 

seldom

 
number
 
connected