Natural Resources and Environment

FIW 2324: Wildlife field biology

Note this guide is to be used as a starting point to find materials for your topic, and should not be mistaken as an all inclusive list of resources.

Types of sources

• Types of Journal Publications (PDF)
• What are primary and secondary sources?(PDF)
• What is Peer-Review? (PDF)

Source for determining peer reviewed journals

Ulrich's Periodical Index

Search help

• Evaluating Information Sources (DOC)
• Search Tips and Strategies (DOC)
• Understanding "Boolean" (PDF)

Finding background information

If you do not know much about your animal, a good place to get started is an encyclopedia such as one of the ones listed here:

• Birds of North America (online resource)
• Encyclopedia of mammals (these circulate, also look for 2001 edition)
• Firefly encyclopedia of reptiles and amphibians (available for checkout)
• Grzimek's animal life encyclopedia (available in the SciTech Ref area, not available for checkout)
• International wildlife encyclopedia (available in the SciTech Ref area, not available for checkout)
• Ken Schultz's field guide to freshwater fish (e-book)
• Wildlife of the Mid-Atlantic: a complete reference guide (available for checkout)

Recommended databases to search

Getting started

• Academic Search Complete
• CSA Illumina, Natural Sciences
• ScienceDirect
• Web of Science

More specialized

• Animal Behavior Abstracts
• Biological Abstracts
• BioOne
• Ecology Abstracts
• Environment Complete
• PsycInfo
• Wildlife & Ecology Studies Worldwide (limited to 5 concurrent users)
• Zoological Record

Journals of importance

General

• Animal Behaviour
• Animal Cognition
• Behavioral Ecology
• Canadian Journal of Zoology
• American Midland Naturalist
• Journal of Wildlife Management

Specific to a particular type of animal species

Amphibians, fish, and other cold-blooded animals

• Copeia
• Ecology of Freshwater Fish
• Herpetologica

Birds

• The Auk
• The Condor
• The Wilson Bulletin (now called the Wilson Journal of Ornithology)

Mammals

• Journal of Mammalian Evolution
• Journal of Mammalogy
• Mammalian Biology

Additional subject guides

• Wildlife subject guide
• Fisheries subject guide
• Biologicial science subject guide
• List of all subject guides