A unit of Lasting Forests
Sustained forests; sustained profits
evolving since March 30, 1999

of an Alternative Wildlife Resource Management

The Course Outline or
One Organization of Key Ideas and Concepts

There are few things in active wildlife resource management (I also call it faunal caring and faunal resource system management) that follow clear patterns or hierarchies. The importance of each factor changes with seasons; dominance of topics changes with research results; the roles of people change with their education, creativity, risk-taking ...and their acceptance by their boss. The hypertext is perfect for the complexities of the resource management world, but people still want and seem to need a two-dimensional list of "what do we need to know?" Studies suggest that most students learn best when they have a course outline. Superior students will overcome the effects of the simplification provided by an outline, but we need to get a firm grounding and then we can deal with the peculiar relations, the contradictions, the topics held ... unanswered and unresolved.

We deal in this course with a review of some topics for many students, a rapid (probably superficial) coverage of some topics for many. It is designed for the advanced undergraduate (junior or senior and early-stage master of science student). It prepares students to gain maximum usefulness from the course Modern Faunal Resource System Management.

The Final List - At the end of the course you will recognize and hopefully be able to think extensively about and discuss all of the items in the list. Is that all there is!...maybe, but probably not.

Introduction - It helps understand the reasons for and orientation of the course.

Disclaimer - Everyone needs a disclaimer and at least a passing effort to be politically correct. Reluctance of professors "to profess" is a major problem, one for the universities, the professorate, and society. Perhaps students can ask questions that allow and encourage them to do so.

Tests and Exams - "Will it be on the exam?", the question that is the death of professors, may be the life of students. Brief comments are made. E-mail the instructor if there are questions. Do not waste psychological energy on test/exam anxiety. Direct your energy at the course content.

Students Who Have Made High Scores - Superior performance needs to be recognized. These students have authorized their names and exam scores to be posted. (The course was first offered in 2004.)

Detailed Objectives for an Introductory Course - The course on which you are currently working is not an introductory or classical course, but an advanced alternative one. You can probably meet all of these objectives now or at least by the end of the course. The list presented here may be used by students who may teach someday. The list shows the complexity of wildlife resource management and may suggest alternative educational strategies, since all objectives are unlikely to be achieved in a classical (2003) 3-semester-hour course.

Now for the real course outline ...

Introduction and Major Questions

1. The Title Page (Index) - Brief introduction to the course and basic connections within the web site.
2. Course Syllabus
3. Contents - a list of the main course files, but not including many other files used within the course)
4. Introduction
5. The Final List - "Giving away the story ending" here is the list of differences between the suggested alternative and currently perceived wildlife management
6. What's wildlife? What's a Resource - The concept and its relevance to "wildlife"
7. What's Management?
8. What's Wildlife Management Now and ...Maybe Later?
9. Definition of Wildlife Resource Management and the Alternatives
10. A Review of Current Conditions and the Needs
    • Your Future in Wildlife Resource Management - Careen opportunities and relations; what the wildlifer does
    • The Situation - A description of conditions perceived to exist within the public resource agency in 2000; the need to move toward a satisfactory condition
    • Toward a Satisfactory Condition - Efforts to formulate a new decision paradigm for agencies and contractors; an alternative to optimization
    • The Myth of Natural Resource Decision-Support Systems - Further movement toward an alternative concept of a satisfactory condition
11. Essentials or Principles or...?
12. Principles - Struggles with the meaning of "Principles" and an argument for a very brief list
13. Fundamentals or Principles - A very long list for comparison with the above principles and for later reduction or expansion.
14. Working the Triangle - The interplay of wild animal populations, faunal space, and people

    Studies and Research - Input Systems for Decisions

15. The Professional Library - Suggestions for building and maintaining a library and flow of information
16. Studies and Research - The limited role of science for providing inputs to decisions
17. The List - A long list of inputs believed to be needed for the effective management of the wildlife resources within a region or enterprise
18. The Reconnaissance- The field trip and first overview of an area with wildlife resource management potentials

    Approaches

19. General Systems and the Rationally Robust
20. Who pays? Efficiency, Effectiveness, and the Costs of Management
21. Individual Animal Health - Herein wildlife resource management deals with work with populations, rarely with individual animals. Many people remain fixed on veterinary work and on the role of diseases. The overlaps are evident. The emphasis remains ,herein, on the population and the resource. A link for pathology and health is provided. See also the Wildlife Disease Association and zoo pathology and Internet leads.
22. The Enterprise Paradigm - The concept of a diverse, modern, sophisticated profit-oriented rural resource system enterprise (e.g., Rural System, Inc.)

    Objectives (Goals)

23. Notes on Faunal System Objectives - Types of objectives, criteria for judging their quality, and samples
24. Performance Measures - Summary or surrogate expressions of objectives and how achievement can be estimated
25. Variety - Often a policy or constraint objective, biodiversity is an expression of conditions, an input to decisions, or a means for evaluating changes as a result of management. It is a topic that does not fit well into a standard outline

    Simultaneous Work with Life-Group Populations, Faunal Space, and Human Groups (Species-Specific Systems)

26. Population Essentials
    • Managing the Animals
    • Structure - game and non-game, life-group concept, the individual and the population, diversity, density, sex and age ratios, genetic groups
    • Dynamics - innate, reproduction, breeding behavior, survival, mortality, migration and other behaviors
    • Population Dynamics - Introduction and .....???????
    • Relations - variety, competition, predation, recreational disturbance, pests and zoonoses
    • Techniques for Changing Population Structure
    • Stocking and Transplanting AnimalsStocking Game - Advantages and disadvantages
    • Rare-Species Issues
    • Managing Damage
    • Bounties - Arguments against their use
    • Hunting Systems
    • Species-Area Relations - The greater the area, the more the species
27. Faunal Space Essentials
    • Managing Faunal Space
    • Refuges, Sanctuaries, Parks, Forests, Preserves, Hunt Clubs, and Management Areas
    • Special Public Areas (BLM, Natural and Research Areas, Wilderness, Foundation Lands)
    • GIS and area/time
    • Use of Geographic Information Systems Tomorrow - A conference speech, 1999, Lake Tahoe relations
    • Abiotic Factors in Management
    • Using Fire and Other Techniques
    • Forest Management
    • Residential Area Management
    • Managing Layers and Volumes, Riparian Areas
    • Edge, Interspersion, and Juxtaposition
    • Rangeland Management
    • Ponds and Stream Management
    • Succession and Transitions
    • Water, Trails, and Dens
    • Carrying Capacity
    • Techniques for Changing Faunal Space
28. Human Group Essentials
    • Objectives
    • Decision making
    • Conservation Education
    • Public Participation
    • Law Enforcement
    • Changing Group Behavior Changes
    • Conflict Resolution
    • Permutations - Sequence of ecological events as well as managerial actions may be more important than counts or amounts

    Unifying Work Including Special Wildlife Resource Systems

29. A List and Comments on the Essentials for the Resource Manager
30. Test Questions
31. Feedback
32. Feedforward
33. A Proposed Owl Resource Enterprise - An owl-based enterprise is proposed as part of Nature Folks of the Rural System or Lasting Forests system being designed
34. A Raccoon System - Recommendations for a single-species emphasis are provided from The Trevey, a dynamic planning or guidance system.
35. Species-Specific Management - A set of about 80 brief statements about actions to take to improve conditions for species is available. You should link first to birds or mammals, then the species. (You are encouraged to assist in expanding this resource for future students.)

    Other Course-Related Topics

36. Competency - A concept for a post-graduation evaluation
37. The Suggestion Box - A place for students and other participants in the website to offer suggestioweb sitetorial to major changes and additions and linkages)

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Last revision October 28, 2003.