Ichthyology - Biol 432 Even Spring Semesters
Instructor: Michael Marchetti
Office: 221 Holt   (office hours: TBA)
Phone #: office 898-5641 
email: mmarchetti@csuchico.edu
web site: http://www.csuchico.edu/~sacperch/ 

  Fish are fascinating creatures, phenomenally diverse and a joy to study.  The occur in both fresh and salt water and inhabit all parts of the globe.  I hope that by the end of the semester you have an appreciation for the evolution, physiology and ecology of this wonderful group of organisms. 

NOTE:  A BACKGROUND IN BIOLOGY AND ZOOLOGY IS NECESSARY FOR THIS COURSE.  IF YOU HAVE NOT PASSED BOTH AN INTRODUCTORY BIOLOGY COURSE (Biology 6B) & AN INTRODUCTORY ZOOLOGY COURSE (Biology 10), YOU ARE NOT ALLOWED TO TAKE THIS CLASS - SO COME TALK TO ME 

Required texts:
-Helfman G.S., B.B. Collette, and D.E. Facey. 1997. The Diversity of Fishes.  Blackwell Science.
-Moyle P.B and J.J Cech, 2003. Fishes: an introduction to ichthyology, 5^th ed. Prentice Hall.
-Miller D. and Lea R. Guide to the Coastal Marine Fishes of California. California Fish Bulletin Number 157, Publication 4065 

Supplemental texts:
-Love, M. 1996. Probably more than you want to know about the fishes of the Pacific Coast, second ed.  Really Big Press. Santa Barbara CA. (RECOMMENDED)
-Moyle, P. B. 2002. Inland Fishes of California. University of California Press (RECOMMENDED)-
-Bond, C.E. 1996. Biology of Fishes, 2^nd ed. Brooks/Cole Publishing.
-Allan J.D. 1995. Stream Ecology: structure and function of running waters. Kluwer Academic Pubs. Boston.

Course Goals:
The primary goal of this course is to introduce you to the general field of ichthyology.  Our focus will be on California and specifically the local bio-region, although many examples and information will be brought from other areas of the country and the world.  I hope you will come away with an appreciation of how the natural history, ecology and issues regarding fishes within our state relate to topics elsewhere in the US and abroad.  In addition, in the laboratory section I will expect you to learn to identify (using a dichotomous key) sixty of the common taxa of primarily California fishes.  I also hope you will develop a deeper appreciation for the intricacy and beauty of natural aquatic systems.
The course will have two distinct yet integrated parts: 1) lecture section - meets once a week for three hours and 2) laboratory section - meets once a week for four hours.  The midterm and final exams can draw on ANY information presented in the class, but will focus primarily on the lecture section. 

Exams:
The two midterm exams will be a refreshing variety of essay questions.  A series of 50+ questions will be handed out before the exam, ten of which will be chosen for the exam.  The final exam will be comprehensive for the whole semester.
Academic Honesty is at a premium in this course, so no cheating or plagiarism will be tolerated.  (See below for what constitutes either cheating or plagiarism).

GRADING                                                            

 Exams                                                   Points
                Midterm 1                              100 pts
                Midterm 2                              100 pts
                Final                                       200 pts
Lab Practical
                Practical 1                              100 pts
                Practical 2                              100 pts
 Research Project
                Paper                                    100 pts
                Poster Presentation                100 pts
Lab Notebooks
                Complete notebook              100 pts
Total Possible Points                          900 pts  

Grading: >95%=A, 90-94%=A-,  85-89 %=B+, 80-84%=B, 75-79%=C+, 70-74%=C, 65-69=D+, 60-64=D, <60%=failure 

Weekend Field Trips
There will be two weekend field trips during the semester (both overnight trips).  Some of these will cost some additional money (room and board).  EVERY student must make at least 1 of the two trips.  Students MUST decide if they are going on the trips at least two weeks in advance, so that preparations can be made.  The trips are the following:

• Bodega Marine Lab - this trip will go to bodega bay, sample near shore marine fishes, tour the marine lab facility.  We will stay at the UCD marine lab facility.  You need to bring towels and sleeping bags.  Room and board (three meals) will be provided.  Cost is $40
• April 30- May 2  Eagle Lake Field Station - this trip will take us to the Field station where we will sample the Great Basin fish fauna of eagle lake and Willow creek.  Students must bring towels, sleeping bags and warm weather gear. Room and board will be provided. Cost is $40. 

Research Project, Presentation and Paper
                Each student will participate in one of three options for a research project.  Two of the options will be field oriented research projects dealing with fish in our local creeks and rivers.  The two field oriented projects will be laid out by the instructor in detail during the second week of lab.

1. Microhabitat study of fish larvae along the Sacramento River. 
2. Fish larvae use of temporary stream habitats
3. Library research paper.  For students not inclined to field work, they will be asked to write a 12 page (2400 word) scientific research paper on an ichthyology related topic approved ahead of time by the instructor.  

                Each student (regardless of the option chosen) will be required to make a poster presentation (or group poster) of their work during the last meeting of the semester.  Posters will be graded on content, originality, creativity, grammar and spelling. 

                Students in the two field projects will also be asked to write up a 1600 word paper (not including graphs and references) detailing their project.  The research paper must follow the following standard scientific research paper format and include the following items:

                A. Abstract (approx. 10 sentence summary of project) (can be its own page)
                B. Introduction (a general literature review of the topic ending with an introduction of the research)
                C. Methods (description of, where, when, how the research was conducted)
                D. Results (what was found by your study)
                 E. Discussion (what your results mean, and how they fit into the general scheme you laid out in the introduction, and how you might changethe                     experiment  if you were to do it over).
                F. List of peer-reviewed references used (research papers and books) cited in the report (must have at least 10 -NOT INCLUDING WEB                         SITES, as web info is notoriously sketchy and often not peer reviewed)
               G. Figures, graphs, or charts that enhance the reader's understanding of the project (avoid 3-D graphs unless necessary)                               

Notebooks - You will be required to keep a lab notebook of sketches and ecological notes that will be turned in for a grade at the end of the semester.  More details about the format will come later 

A NOTE ABOUT REFERENCES:
Science works because scientists use a process of peer review.  What this means is that before being published in a journal, a scientists work has been scrutinized by 3-4 of their peers (other scientists).  This allows the community of scientists to place some quality control on what gets called scientific research in their field. Work that does not meet these high standards is not published.  Peer review happens for all scholarly journals (Nature, Science, Ecology, Transactions of the American Fisheries Society etc) as well as for books and book chapters.  Peer review DOES NOT happen for the vast majority of material that is "published" on the web.  Therefore in this class we will only use references that have been peer reviewed.  Do not go to the web for detailed information about a topic and do not cite web sites as a reference.  The material on the web is notoriously sketchy and very often can be wrong.  Only cite journal articles or published books.

A NOTE ABOUT PLAGARISM
Plagarism is when you take someone else's ideas and writings and pass them off as your own.  This is a form of lying, it is considered a gross breech of academic honesty and will be delt with severely (automatic failure).  Plagarism can take many forms.  It is not acceptable to take paragraphs,  sentences or even phrases from someone else's writing and put them into your paper as your own ideas!  YOU MUST PARAPHRASE THE IDEAS OR PHRASES.  Even when you do pharaphrase the ideas you still must cite where the information originated.  This usually takes the form of a citation like the following: (Marchetti and Moyle 2001) and the full reference must be given in the reference section at the end of the paper.  If you are confused about plagarism please come talk to me.  It is much better to be safe than sorry with this issue.

 
A NOTE ABOUT STUDENT POSTERS
(or So you want to get an A on your poster ...)

Follow these General Guidelines

1. POSTERS ARE A VISUAL MEDIA.  – therefore you should make your poster easy to read as well as pleasant to look at.  You should follow a standard logical format.  Introduction on the left top, methods and results in the middle and discussion on the right top.
2. GRAPHS & FIGURES ARE MAJOR PLAYERS - This means that you should spend a lot of time on your figures.  They must be very legible (contrasting colors, LARGE BOLD FONTS) and convey the idea/results quickly and concisely.  They should not be overly busy or complex.  Making graphs work for you is difficult and requires work.  You should spend a good amount of time working on your figures/graphs to make them easily interpretable and visually appealing.  Do not use pie charts (unless abolutely necessary) as they are not very scientific.  Avoid using three dimentional figures unless the reader will gain something from the addition of the third dimention.
3. DO NOT USE ODD OR UNUSUAL FONTS/DESIGNS – The best posters are ones that approach the science with a relatively serious attitude and do not put ‘cute’ fonts or ‘cuddly’ pictures on your poster to just ‘fill in space’  Informative picutes that help illustrate your project are welcome but should not be the main focus of the poster.
4. NOT YOUR PAPER ON A BOARD – Do not make the mistake of taking your written paper and just cut and pasting it on to a board.  Typically posters will have a much reduced volume of text compared to the paper.  This means you have to distill the important information out of your paper.  Your poster should hit the highlights, not all the details.
5. HAVE ALL THE RIGHT PARTS – Posters will have the same fundamental parts as a good paper: introduction, methods, results, discussion and perhaps short section on references.  Typically a poster will also have a short abstract that is in the middle and large so that people can quickly glance at the poster and get the gist of the topic.

 Ichthyology Laboratory & Lecture Schedule

What      DATE                     TOPICS

Lab         Jan 26                     Introduction to course, internal and external anatomy
Lecture   Jan 28                     -fossils, geologic history, early fish ancestors
                                              -ancient fishes - ostracoderms, placoderms
Lab         Feb 2                      Project description, demonstrations, and organization
Lecture   Feb 4                      -early chondrichthyian fishes
                                              -rise to modern fishes
Lab         Feb 9                      Fish ID - common marine species
Lecture   Feb 11                    -respiration, metabolism, energetics
                                              -sensory systems
Lab         Feb 16                    Fish ID - common marine spp II
Lecture   Feb 18                    -functional morphology
                                              -reproduction
Lab         Feb 23                    Fish ID - ancient and significant fish
Lecture   Feb 25                    Exam I
Lab         Mar 1                      Fish printing, age and growth
Lecture   Mar 3                      -hagfish and lampreys
                                              -chondrichthyes
Lab         Mar 8                      Lab Practical I

Lecture   Mar 10                    -relict fishes, eels and herring
                                              -minnows and catfish
spring break 

Lab         Mar 22                    Fish ID - the minnows & suckers
Lecture   Mar 24                    -smelt, salmon, pike
                                              -rockfish, pipefish and the rest
Lab         Mar 29                    Fish ID - centrarchids & catfish
Lecture   Mar 31                    Memorial Day NO CLASS
Lab         Apr 5                      Fish ID - sculpin, etc
Lecture   Apr 7                      -rockfish biology
                                             -fish larvae
Lab         Apr 12                    Project Work in Lab
Lecture   Apr 14                    -Exam II
Lab         Apr 19                    Lab Practical II
Lecture   Apr 21                    -predator/prey interactions
                                             -group behavior
Lab         Apr 26                    -patterns in CA stream fishes (Putah Creek) {NOTE THE CHANGE à LECTURE IN LAB DAY}
                                             - zoogeography
Lecture   Apr 28                    - deep sea, polar
                                              - introduced fishes (case studies)
Lab         May 3                     Project Work in Lab
Lecture   May 5                     -estuaries, tropical reefs
                                              -introduced fishes (big patterns)     
Lab         May 10                   Poster Symposium – (poster due)
Lecture   May 12                   -IBI's and bioassessment using fish
                                              Desert Fishes