Bigger doesn’t mean bolder: behavioral variation of four wild rodent species to novelty and predation risk following a fast-slow continuum

Table 1 Behavioral response variables measured from experimental trials

Response	Unit measured	Definition
Exploring^a	Time (s.)	Locomotive activity, investigation of the arena and objects, climbing
Foraging^a	Time (s.)	The subject consumed and/ or searched for seeds in the foraging tray
Motionless^b	Time (s.)	The subject remained stationary (except for breathing); body remained stationary with occasional head scanning
Concealing^b	Time (s.)	The subject was in the hide (at least 75% of the body was concealed); the head was slightly exposed from the hide
Grooming	Time (s.)	The subject was grooming, e.g. licking or rubbing
Consumption^c,d	Weight (g)	The amount of seeds consumed (± 0.1 g). Calculated by subtracting the remaining amount from the initial 5.0 g
Foraging events^d	No. occurrences	The number of events of foraging of the test subject
Latency to forage^d	Time (s.)	The amount of time before the subject started foraging
Jumping^d	No. occurrences	The subject actively jumped; all four paws left the base of the arena
Contact	No. occurrences	The subject investigated or had tactile contact with the treatment apparatus, e.g. sniffing or biting

Notes: seconds (s.), number of (no.) occurrences, grams (g). Response variables adapted from [29, 49, 50]. ^a refers to behaviors included in the ‘Non-defensive’ behavioral category. ^b refers to behaviors included in the ‘Defensive’ behavioral category. ^c this behavior was transformed to Consumption ratio, by calculating the food eaten proportional to body weight and expressed as a percentage. ^d indicates behaviors removed from the focus of the main text, see Supplementary material (Table S4, Fig. S1, Figure S2) for results. For a complete list of the means and standard errors of all the response variables, please refer to Supplementary material (Table S1 and S2)

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