Wildlife Habitat Management

The primary goal for this course is to help you put into practice tools you have been acquiring in your other Natural Resources Conservation courses. We will explore wildlife-habitat relationships in depth, through the lenses of basic field zoology and natural history, evolutionary biology, and ecological theory. We will introduce you to quantitative tools used to explain ecological processes and their influence on wildlife and their environment. We will examine the dynamics and management of various habitats in New England, North America, and elsewhere through field visits and use of primary literature. But most importantly, we will ask you to take on some of the responsibilities for gathering and synthesizing information about a particular piece of land and its associated wildlife in order to contribute to an ongoing management planning process for the Town of Amherst’s conservation lands.