Forest rodents play important roles on the regeneration of plants by scattering seeds into microsites where they can germinate and grow. However, current research in this area has not been comprehensive enough, so considerable controversy exists over whether forest rodents have the ability to detect weevil-infested seeds. Moreover, no reports exist on the effects of food abundance on the ability of rodents to detect such seeds. Acorns of Quercus aliena, a common and often dominant Fagaceae species in many temperate and subtropical forests, are an important food resource for forest rodents. Much attention has been paid to the dispersal biology of Quercus spp.; however, knowledge related to the ability of rodents to detect weevil-infested Q. aliena acorns in the Qinling Mountains is still poor. The predation and dispersal of intact and weevil-infested acorns of Q. aliena were investigated using acorns with plastic tags in Foping National Nature Reserve (35°0'N, 105°30'E), located in the southern aspect of the Qinling Mountains in Shaanxi Province, China, during September-November, 2011 and March-May, 2012. Twenty plots (1 m× 1 m), separated by 15 m along a transect line, were established as acorn stations in a deciduous broad-leaved forest. In October 2011, 20 intact and 20 weevil-infested acorns were placed at each station and acorn fates were monitored at 1, 3, 5, 10, 17, 27 and 50 days after initial placement. During each visit, we searched the area around each station (radius<30 m) for acorns removed by rodents and recorded acorn fates. The results revealed significant differences in acorn lifetime when comparing the stations for intact and weevil-infested acorns in the two seasons. In spring, almost all intact acorns (99%) were removed from each station by the third day, while weevil-infested acorns remained on site for longer than three days during the lifetime of a station. In autumn, both intact and weevil-infested acorns were eaten in situ with no significant differences between use rates, while there were significant differences in spring when rodents prioritized eating intact acorns. Intact and infested acorns were also eaten at significantly different rates after removal not only in autumn but also in spring. In spring, rodents primarily removed and ate intact acorns early in the season. Intact and infested acorns were also cached at significantly different rates in autumn, when rodents cached more intact acorns than weevil-infested acorns. In spring, although caching of intact acorns peaked on the first day, as a result of the large number of cached acorns eaten at a later time, there were no significant differences in acorn caching rates between the two kinds of acorns in spring. This study indicated that forest rodents could accurately determine if acorns were weevil-infested in the Qiling Mountains, but food abundance may affect the acorn selection strategy of rodents when both intact and weevil-infested acorns are made available. In autumn with abundant food resources available, rodents primarily selected intact acorns to cache; in spring, when food resources were relatively poor, rodents weakened their selecting strategy and tended to eat both kinds of acorns simultaneously. This may affect the fates of intact and weevil-infested acorns and then influence the dispersal and natural regeneration of Quercus aliena.