COMPARISON OF TRAPS AND BAITS FOR CENSUSING SMALL MAMMALS IN NEOTROPICAL LOWLANDS

Snap-traps, live-traps, and baits affect the ability to capture small mammals, but few previous studies have involved sampling communities o f small mammals in tropical environments. We tested differences in cap tures of small marsupials and rodents by Victor snap-traps versus Sher man live-traps and by two types of bait in lowland rainforest at Reser va Cuzco Amazonico, southeastern Peru. Snap-traps took ca. 3.5 times a s many individuals as live-traps. Snap-traps also captured more specie s (and more rare species), but we attribute this to more numerous capt ures overall because the relative proportions of species captured by t he two traps generally were the same. Type of bait had little impact o n our trapping results.