Conservation Biology Online

I've decided to put a large portion of my conservation biology lectures online. They will be slightly less detailed than what I would normally do in class but I will make up for by extra readings. I asked a few of our graduates in graduate school what we were missing and one theme was reading and critiquing the peer-reviewed literature. So that will be part of the course that's for our students but not the public. By what not have public lectures. Maybe I'll get some good feedback. 

As of 4/11 - first two lectures, lecture on threats to tropical forests 

This will be a work in progress.

1. Introduction to Conservation Biology

2. History of Conservation Biology

• Grey Towers - Pinchot family (summer) estate and historical site of Yale School of Forestry practicum site
• Aldo Leopold Foundation 
• Society for Conservation Biology 

3. Species and Species Diversity

• Part 1: Species Concepts
• Part 2: Species Diversity in Space in Time 
• Part 3: Species Diversity: Measuring and dynamics 

4. Ecosystem Services 

    

5. Extinctions 

6. Pollution

7. Habitat Loss

8. Habitat Fragmentation

    Part 1 and Part 2

 

9. Overexploitation

10. Urbanization 

11. Invasive Species and Emerging Diseases 

12. Climate Change

13. Threats to Tropical Diversity

14. Threats to Marine Diversity 

15. Global Conservation 

16. Designing Parks 

17. Conservation Law 

18. Habitat Management 

19. Museums, Zoos, Gardens and Freezers

20. Restoration 

21. Funding Conservation 

22. Sustainability  

Adventures in DNA barcoding

So we got the OK to get two DNA barcoding kits from Carolina Scientific. So on the list is a few plants (grasses are a pain to ID), leaf hoppers (vary in host specificity) , beetles, and weevils. The weevil ID is for Mike Steele. We've been raising weevils in our cold room that undergraduates found in acorns.

So, hopefully, we can turn the below into data! 

Fantastic fungi found on sleepy sloths

Sloths are remarkable creatures. Their slow movements seem out of entirely out of place in South and Central American rainforests where fast and efficient predators like jaguars hunt the forest floor and birds of prey hunt from above. While during surveys in a 1-ha forest fragment I happened across a sloth skull. 

Here a National Geographic video of a sloth being taken a Harpy Eagle. 

I have only seen a single living sloth up close in the wild while it was crossing the road and many more as road kill along the highway that runs north from Manaus. Remarkably, I did see a sloth within the Manaus city limits moving about the Cecropia trees. 

A team of researchers published a recent paper in PLOS describing assays of ascomycetes (cup fungi) living on sloth fur and found species that were active against malaria (kills >500,000 people/year), Chagas disease, bacteria, and even cancer cells. They detected 82 operational taxonomic units (essentially species). Sloths are, essentially, their own biome with predators and symbionts, autotrophs and heterotrophs. 

Just in case the eagle video gets you down, here's some sloth cuteness

But, whatever you do, don't fall in love in a sloth

MY YEAR OF DARWIN (#YEAROFDARWIN)

4 Jan 2014: ""I do not believe that any one could have shown more zeal for the most holy cause than I did for shooting birds" CD autobiography

As a college student, Darwin developed a love for shooting and had his gun at Cambridge, where he was studying theology. In his college dorm, he would practice in front of a mirror and would shoot at candles with just the cap. The cap is filled with a powder that fires under compression and sends the fire to the main charge. Just firing the cap creates enough pressure to create a puff of air at the end of the barrel. Darwin used this puff of air to blow out a candle held by a friend - obviously a very good friend. This practice would serve him well as he toured the world and collected birds. 

Though collecting birds sounds like a hobby, it is the term used to describe the practice of killing and stuffing birds. In Darwin's day the product was a bird that would be put into a museum and not rot since all the tissue that easily breaks down has been removed. In fact, Darwin's birds that he collected are still in museums and can be used for study (though I don't know how easily they can be accessed). Today, birds are still collected and we store stomach contents, muscle and other tissue for DNA. A smaller number of birds are pickled or skeletonized. The number of birds collected is typically a fraction of a percent of the birds that are killed by other means (e.g., free-roaming cats). A recent paper in Nature puts collecting into perspective. 

A West Nile virus recipe for a the whole neighborhood

Ingredients

• Impervious surfaces (roads and roofs work best)
• Breeding habitat for mosquitoes (ditches and sewer drains) 
• Mosquitoes (Culex or Aedes) 
• Simplified bird community (robins work best but you can substitute house  sparrows) 
• Mild winters followed by extended dry periods with periodic heavy rains
• People
• Serves tens of thousands!

If you have trouble putting together the ingredients, no problem!  

Kits are available 

Just add an urban environment!