How much do field mice prefer dwarf bamboo seeds? Two-choice experiments between seeds of Sasa borealis and several tree species on the forest floor

• Published in: Ecology and evolution Vol. 13; no. 10; pp. e10636 - n/a
• Main Authors: Suzuki, Hanami, Kajimura, Hisashi
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: England John Wiley & Sons, Inc 01-10-2023; John Wiley and Sons Inc; Wiley
• Subjects: acorn; Apodemus argenteus; Apodemus speciosus; Bamboo; Bambusoideae; Dispersal; Ecosystem Ecology; Flowering; Food; Foraging behavior; Forest ecosystems; Forest floor; Forests; Life cycles; masting; Plant species; Predation; Rodents; Sasa borealis; Seed dispersal; seed preference; Seeding; Seeds; Terrestrial ecosystems; seed preference; Apodemus argenteus; Apodemus speciosus; Sasa borealis; acorn; masting
• ISSN: 2045-7758; 2045-7758
• DOI: 10.1002/ece3.10636

Bambusoideae is a taxon of mass-flowering monocarpic perennials with a long life cycle. Forest ecosystems are affected by Bambusoideae seeding and death events in various ways, including an increased abundance of
spp. The utilization and preference of dwarf bamboo seeds over tree seeds by field mice remain elusive. Therefore, we aimed to determine whether field mice prefer dwarf bamboo to tree seeds. We examined one dwarf bamboo species (
) against four tree species with varying acorn/fruit traits (
,
,
, and
). The seeds were placed in a container in a forest among dead
culms, with an automatic camera monitoring the setup. The examined seeds were mainly foraged by two field mouse species,
and
with preference in the following order:
,
,
,
, and
. Our findings indicated that during
mast seeding years, predation pressure on
and
seeds could be considerably reduced. This suggests that mast seeding might disrupt the normal pattern of survival, and seed dispersal patterns, potentially altering the forest vegetation composition.