Undergraduate students and I conducted a survey of the terrestrial small mammals that occur at Terrapin Creek State Nature Preserve (TCSNP).  The preserve was created in 1992 and encompasses 160 acres of a wetland complex in the East Gulf Coastal Plain.  We conducted three-day trapping sessions, using live traps and pitfall traps, every 6 weeks for a one year period; completing 10,860 trap nights.  Our objectives were to:

• characterize the mammalian fauna inhabiting the preserve and
• determine the accuracy of KY-GAP data for predicting small mammal species occurrence in TCSNP.

        Terrapin Creek State Nature Preserve (TCSNP) is located in southwestern Kentucky. Properties that comprise the TCSNP are indicated in red on the top map.

Alan Whited and Kelly Veatch set up a pitfall trap (left).  Stephen Compton and Lee Webb work to stay upright in the swamps (middle).  Weighing a prairie vole (right).

We had a total of 1,382 captures.  A total of 659 different individuals were captured within a total of 14 different species of small rodents and insectivores.

In early spring, prairie voles Microtus ochrogaster and white-footed mice Peromyscus leucopus were the most abundant species.  During summer the density of these species declined and the density of marsh rice rats palustris rose dramatically.

Community composition was similar on the eight tracts of land that comprise Terrapin Creek State Nature Preserve.

A total of 17 small mammal species were predicted to occur at TCSNP by the KY Gap Analysis Project.  Of these, four species (in orange) had been confirmed as present within Graves Co. (in which TCSNP is located) prior to our trapping.  We confirmed an additional nine species (in green) through our trapping.  We captured all but four species (in white) that were predicted by KY-GAP.