ENSC 50246 - Biodiversity

Prerequisites: Two semesters of college-level biology courses. This course introduces skills to describe and study the diversity of life. It is immersion, field-intensive instruction. General concepts include patterns of global biodiversity, biogeography of the Southern Plains, conservation biology, pressures on biodiversity, and national/international biodiversity protection efforts and policies. Field skill instruction starts with context description, emphasizing vegetation structure, followed by plant community description. Subsequent modules focus on inventorying animal communities, starting with insects and continuing with freshwater invertebrates, fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals. The field skill component of the course concludes with a week-long exercise in habitats outside of north-central Texas. Biodiversity information management is learned by developing a relational database coupled with a local Geographic Information System.





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