Foraging Preference of Animals on Campus at Juniata College

• Hailey R. Campbell

  Juniata College

  Author

• Jessie R. Freeland

  Juniata College

  Author

• Mel J. Mendez

  Juniata College

  Author

• Bernadette R. Traina

  Juniata College

  Author

Several studies have shown that when animals live in close proximity to humans, they will begin to stray further from their homes. On the campus of Juniata College, this can be seen with squirrels and rabbits. In our study, we wanted to see if animals preferred feeding at ground locations protected from predators by vegetation, compared to ground locations without protection or cover. We had three different locations of food, each varying in distance from dense cover. An ANOVA test was run to test our hypothesis that there would be the most activity at the feeders placed underneath vegetation, and the results provided a p-value of 0.975. This provides us with no significant results because it is higher than the base p-value of 0.05, showing that the location of the feeders relative to vegetation does not influence wildlife foraging habits.

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