Abstract
Rats foraged on a four-arm radial maze with one, two, three, and four food items (0.65.g pieces of cheese) placed on different arms (patches) of the maze. In two experiments, the hypothesis was tested that rats should carry food to the center of the maze more often when a patch contains one food item than when it contains multiple food items. Support for this prediction was found when the tendency to carry initial items encountered in patches was compared among the different sized patches. However, a further observation failed to support the hypothesis: Food carrying declined from first to last item encountered in multiple-item patches with clustered food items. Experiment 1 revealed that food carrying was reduced when travel time was increased by barriers placed at arm entrances. Both Experiments 1 and 2 indicated that the tendency for rats to carry food to the center of the radial maze increased as the distance of food encountered on an arm increased from the center. In both experiments, some rats dealt with the problem of multiple items by resorting to multiple-item loading, and some rats carried food items from the end of an arm to a point on the arm nearer the center for consumption.
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This research was supported by an operating grant from the National Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada to W. A. Roberts.
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Ash, M., Roberts, W.A. Central-place foraging by rats on the radial maze: The effects of patch size, food distribution, and travel time. Animal Learning & Behavior 20, 127–134 (1992). https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03200410
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.3758/BF03200410