JONES: PODOMYSFLORIDANUS ON THE ORDWAY PRESERVE


Table 5 Continued


ID YEAR No PB #B


DISCUSSION


 Prescribed burns on the Ordway Preserve had no immediate impacts on mortality or
the size and locations of home ranges of Podomys. More trapping effort was required to
capture mice on the unburned sites and, over a period of several years, numbers of Podomys
on unburned sites appeared less predictable and less stable than numbers on burned areas.
On the unburned areas, all mice were captured at peripheral burrows (on the edge of
unburned sandhill near old pasture or burned sandhill habitats), and in some years no
animals were captured on these areas. Additional experiments with more replications (and
burned and unburned sites of equal area) are needed, but these might be difficult to perform
at Ordway, given the large home ranges and fluctuating populations of these animals. The
immediate response of P. floridanus to the prescribed burs on the Ordway appears to be
neutral (Jones 1992). However, it is clear that the cessation of fire allows conversion of
high pine to xeric hardwood or mixed pine forests (Laessle 1958; Myers 1985) in which


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