Department of Biology & Biochemistry, Unit Catalogue 2008/09 |
BB20041 Field course |
| Credits: 6 |
| Level: Intermediate |
| Semester: 2 |
| Assessment: CW 100% |
| Requisites: |
| Before taking this unit you must take BB10012 and take BB20040 |
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Aims & Learning Objectives: Aims: To introduce the student to natural habitats in ways that enable the students to recognise patterns of distribution and behaviour of organisms and to question the basis of these patterns and behaviours. To introduce the student to the use of appropriate sampling patterns, experimental design, data gathering and statistical analysis. After taking the course the student should be able to: *appreciate how aspects of behavioural ecology and of community structure can be investigated *understand how these behaviours and structure may have arisen and how they are maintained *design and perform a short field-based investigation; analyse and graphically present data *prepare a written report of field-based investigations. Content: Visit to ecosystem types of varying complexity and subject to different kinds of selection process, such as rocky shore, sand dune, coastal grassland, salt marsh, woodland, moorland and fresh water. Investigation of components of these ecosystem types including spatial distribution, size and age distributions, reproduction and behaviour. Each student designs and carries out a half-day and a two-day field-based investigation; a preliminary report of the two-day investigation is presented as a short talk on the last day of the field trip; the data from the investigations are analysed and graphically presented using University computing facilities after the field trip. Students are required to make a financial contribution to the field course (currently 140), and are requiredto be available for any of the scheduled field courses which will be held out of term-time (usually the first two weeks of the Easter vacation and if numbers require, the first week of the summer vacation). |