Zoo 204.B - Fundamentals of Ecology
Course Syllabus – Fall 2004
Instructor: Thomas O. Crist, Department of Zoology
Office: 172 Pearson, 9-6187, cristto@muohio.edu
Meeting Time and Place: MWF 9:00-9:50, Pearson 116
Required Textbook: Ecology: Concepts and Applications, 3rd ed. Manuel C. Molles, McGraw-Hill.
The objective of the course is to understand basic ecological principles and their applications to problems in resource management and conservation. Ecology is a broad discipline that has specialized practitioners, including those who study species conservation, forest management, or nutrient cycling in lakes, to name a few. Ecologists study a variety of scientific problems that are important to the biodiversity of organisms, the environment, and to human society. Contemporary ecology is a synthetic science drawing on biology, chemistry, geology, math, and statistics. Therefore, you will be challenged to learn and integrate material from the various disciplines necessary to the understanding of ecological processes.
The course involves attending lecture, reading the textbook, and writing a group report on a computer simulation exercise. There will be some overlap between the textbook readings and lecture content. Some topics will be covered in greater depth in lecture than in the book, whereas other topics will be left largely to readings. Exams will emphasize material covered in class, so it is in your best interest to attend class. Lecture outlines from in-class PowerPoint presentations are available online at http://zoology.muohio.edu/crist where you can follow a link to Zoo 204 course notes. The online notes are outlines only, and do not contain all of the material covered in class.
You will be evaluated primarily by your performance on four examinations–three mid-term exams and a final. All exams will be multiple-choice format, and questions will test on ecological principles, examples provided in class, and graph interpretation. Each exam will focus on material covered since the previous exam, and about 25% of the final exam will be comprehensive. The remaining portion of your grade will be based on a group-written report on a computer simulation exercise. The course grade will be determined equally among three mid-term exams (20% each), the written report (20%), and a final exam (20%). Class participation is strongly encouraged and will affect grading decisions in borderline cases.
Assignment of a letter grade will be as follows: 97-100=A+, 93-96=A, 90-92=A-, 87-89=B+, 83-86=B, 80-82=B-, 77-79=C+, 73-77=C, 70-72=C-, 67-69=D+, 63-67=D, 60-62=D-, <60=F. Grading is not based on a curve; there is no pre-determined number of A's, B's, C's, etc.
This course
is an option for Level II of the Animal Diversity thematic sequence.
Zoo 204 provides the principles for understanding how animals interact
with their environments, and how these interactions produce the patterns of
biodiversity that we observe at local and global scales. Specifically, this
course meets the goals of the Miami plan in the following ways.
(1) Thinking critically – Students will be expected to evaluate a variety
of mechanisms for explaining the occurrence or absence of species from all
subdisciplines of ecology, from physiological to ecosystem ecology. Specific ecological processes that influence
diversity at the population and community levels will be explored in more
detail using computer simulation exercises followed by a written synthesis
of relevant primary scientific literature.
(2) Understanding contexts – Ecological principles are relevant to
the conservation of animal diversity and the management of natural resources
in environments that are highly influenced by human activities. In this course, we will consider several examples
in which scientific principles can be used to guide environmental decision-making
in different socioeconomic and cultural contexts. (3) Engaging with other learners – Students
will work with classmates in small groups to complete modeling assignments
in similar manner that a group of scientists, managers, or consultants might
address a problem in the management of species diversity. (4) Reflecting and acting – Even nonscientists
now realize that worldwide loss of biodiversity represents an environmental,
political, and moral crisis for humans. Students will be asked to reflect on the place
of humans in the environment and to consider how ecological principles can
help solve environmental problems. By
mastering the principles of ecology, it is hoped that students will gain a
fundamental understanding of the nature of environmental problems and that
they will be able to use these principles as global citizens to understand
future political, cultural, and social issues.
Written
Report on the Computer Exercise (Due Date: Friday, October 29)
You will work in groups of 3 people for the in-class computer exercise,
and later submit a written report together as a group.
You may think of your group as an environmental consulting firm or
a panel of scientists hired to answer a particular ecological problem. The exercise is on population viability, which
is widely used in assessing extinction risk of species under different environmental
conditions. In class, you will decide
as a group the specific problem that you will address, and conduct preliminary
computer simulations. After consulting
the scientific literature, you will likely need to conduct additional simulations
outside of class. Then, as a group,
write a 5-7 page paper (including tables and graphs) on the results of your
simulations. The paper should contain:
(1) a short introduction outlining the general topic and objectives; (2) the
specific methods used to conduct the simulations and the analysis of computer
output; (3) a description of the results along with tables and figures summarizing
the data; and (4) a discussion that provides interpretation of the results
including references to the appropriate literature where relevant. Do not place all of the graphs you produced
in the paper; choose only the most important findings to show in a figure. The results from multiple computer simulations
can be summarized in a table. Your
discussion might also include specific management recommendations based on
your scientific findings. Check for
spelling and grammatical errors. You will be graded on your writing, your
interpretation of the data, appropriate use of published literature, and your
synthesis of the results. You must
cite at least three peer-reviewed journal articles, review, or book monographs
in your report. Most journals
are now available electronically by accessing the library web page (http://www.lib.muohio.edu). See the end of the syllabus for a partial
list of peer-reviewed journals that publish ecological research. To find a particular journal, use the online
catalog Sherlock. If the journal is
available electronically, Sherlock will provide a link to the journal. To do key-word searches for a particular topic
(e.g. Population Viability of Butterflies), I suggest that you use the Science
Citation Index (also known as the Web of Science) or Biological Abstracts.
Note that internet web sites
have not been subjected to scientific peer review and will not count toward
the requirement to use three peer-reviewed articles. Use an author-date format for in-text citations
(e.g. Smith 1995 for a single author, Smith and Clark 1995 for two
authors, or Smith et al. 1995 for multiple authors), and give a complete list
of references at the end of the paper. Refer to the articles in the body of the text by authors’ last
names and year only; do not give the full names of the authors or the titles
of the articles in the text. This
information belongs in the list of references at the end of the paper. All members of your group will receive the
same grade on the exercise.
|
Week |
Day |
Date |
Lecture Topics |
Text Reading |
|
1 |
W |
25 Aug |
Introduction & The Scope of Ecology |
Chapter 1 |
|
|
F |
27 Aug |
Levels of Organization and Scaling |
|
|
2 |
M |
30 Aug |
Physical Factors: Temperature |
Chapter 4 |
|
|
W |
1 Sep |
Physical Factors: Moisture |
Chp 5: 117-121, 137-138 |
|
|
F |
3 Sep |
Light and Energy Exchange |
Chp 6: 145-156, 162 |
|
3 |
T |
7 Sep |
Exchange Day: Soils and Effects of Fire |
Chapter 2 |
|
|
W |
8 Sep |
Global Climate |
|
|
|
F |
10 Sep |
Global Climate and Biome Distributions |
|
|
4 |
M |
13 Sep |
Aquatic Environments |
Chapter 3 |
|
|
W |
15 Sep |
Aquatic Environments (cont.) |
|
|
|
F |
17 Sep |
Exam I |
|
|
5 |
M |
20 Sep |
Biodiversity |
Chapter 8 |
|
|
W |
22 Sep |
Genetic Variation |
|
|
|
F |
24 Sep |
Natural Selection, Speciation and Extinction |
|
|
6 |
M |
27 Sep |
Introduction to Populations |
Chapter 9 |
|
|
W |
29 Sep |
Life Tables and Life History |
Chapter 10 |
|
|
F |
1 Oct |
Population Growth |
|
|
7 |
M |
4 Oct |
Population Regulation |
Chapter 11 |
|
|
W |
6 Oct |
Computer Exercise on Population Viability |
|
|
|
F |
8 Oct |
Computer Exercise on Population Viability |
|
|
8 |
M |
11 Oct |
Human Population Growth and Harvesting |
|
|
|
W |
13 Oct |
Exam II |
|
|
|
F |
15 Oct |
Mid-Term Holiday (No Class) |
|
|
9 |
M |
18 Oct |
Population Interactions: Mutualism |
Chapter 15 |
|
|
W |
20 Oct |
Population Interactions: Competition |
Chp 13: 324-330 |
|
|
F |
22 Oct |
Population Interactions: Competition (cont.) |
Chp 22: 405-406 |
|
10 |
M |
25 Oct |
Population Interactions: Predation |
Chapter 14 |
|
|
W |
27 Oct |
Population Interactions: Herbivory |
|
|
|
F |
29 Oct |
Population Interactions: Parasitism * |
|
|
11 |
M |
1 Nov |
Community Concepts |
|
|
|
W |
3 Nov |
Communities: Species Diversity |
Chapter 16 |
|
|
F |
5 Nov |
Communities: Species Diversity & Biogeography |
Chapter 22 |
|
12 |
M |
8 Nov |
Communities: Disturbance and Succession |
Chapter 20 |
|
|
W |
10 Nov |
Communities: Disturbance and Succession (cont.) |
|
|
|
F |
12 Nov |
Exam III |
|
|
13 |
M |
15 Nov |
Ecosystem Concepts |
Chapter 17 |
|
|
W |
17 Nov |
Ecosystems: Food Webs |
|
|
|
F |
19 Nov |
Ecosystems: Food Webs (cont.) |
|
|
14 |
M |
22 Nov |
Ecosystems: Energy Flow and Productivity |
Chapter 18 |
|
|
W, F |
24, 26 Nov |
Thanksgiving Holiday |
|
|
15 |
M |
29 Nov |
Ecosystems: Nutrient Cycling |
Chapter 19 |
|
|
W |
1 Dec |
Ecosystems: Nutrient Cycling (cont.) |
|
|
|
F |
3 Dec |
Landscape Ecology |
Chapter 21 |
|
16 |
M |
6 Dec |
Global Ecology |
Chapter 23 |
|
|
W |
8 Dec |
Global Ecology (cont.) |
|
|
|
F |
10 Dec |
Review |
|
* Computer Exercise Due Friday, October 29
Final Examination, Monday, December 13, 5:30 pm
A partial list of peer-reviewed journals that publish ecological research. Many of these journals are available electronically (check http://www.lib.muohio.edu). High-profile scientific journals such as Science, Nature, and BioScience also periodically publish articles on ecological research.
Advances in Ecological Research
American Naturalist
American Midland Naturalist
Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics
Australian Journal of Ecology
Biodiversity and Conservation
Biological Conservation
Biotropica
Canadian Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences
Canadian Journal of Zoology
Conservation Biology
Conservation Ecology
Copeia
Ecography
Ecology
Ecology Letters
Ecological Applications
Ecological Entomology
Ecological Monographs
Ecosystems
Environmental Entomology
Environmental Management
Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry
Forest Ecology and Management
Freshwater Biology
Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment
Functional Ecology
Global Change Biology
Global Ecology and Biogeography
Journal of Animal Ecology
Journal of Applied Ecology
Journal of Arachnology
Journal of Arid Environments
Journal of Avian Ecology
Journal of Biogeography
Journal of Ecology
Journal of Great Lakes Research
Journal of Herpetology
Journal of Mammalogy
Journal of the North American Benthological Society
Journal of Range Management
Journal of Tropical Ecology
Journal of Vegetation Science
Journal of Wildlife Management
Landscape Ecology
Limnology and Oceanography
Molecular Ecology
Oecologia
Oikos
Restoration Ecology
Restoration and Management Notes
Transactions of the American Fisheries Society
The Condor
The Auk
Trends in Ecology and Evolution
Wildlife Monographs
Wildlife Research