Study Questions
Remember:
- Not all questions can be asked on an exam
- While questions on an exam will test your knowledge of many of these topics, the actual exam questions
will often be framed/asked in different ways
- This is not all possible topics and questions
- Some of these questions and topics may not be covered on a particular exam because we did not make it
through all the material prior to the exam
- Exams are comprehensive
1. What are wildlife?
2. What is wildlife ecology? Management? Conservation?
3. How has the definition of wildlife changed through time?
4. What is the ultimate goal in wildlife management/conservation? What are 3 areas we can work to achieve
the goal?
5. What is the “Law of the Limiting Link”? How does it relate to wildlife management?
6. What is a conservationist?
7. When did we start managing wildlife? Why?
8. How have attitudes towards wildlife and wildlife management changed through time? Why?
9. What are some of the significant laws related to wildlife and its management? What makes them
significant?
10. Who are some of the notable people in wildlife? Why are they notable?
11. Who was Aldo Leopold? What did he do?
12. What are the Era’s related to the history of wildlife management in the U.S.? What was the theme of
each era and what were 5 significant events or laws from each era?
13. What was the Roosevelt Doctrine and how did it affect wildlife conservation?
14. When did the first conservation movement begin?
15. When were the first hunting licenses required? First closed seasons on hunting game? First exotic
introduced to the U.S.?
16. Describe the American Game Policy.
17. Why were the Lacey and Migratory Bird Hunting Stamp Acts important?
18. Why is the P-R Act so important?
19. What are 5 nationally recognized NGO’s that relate to wildlife?
20. What is the North American Model for Wildlife Conservation?
21. Who owns wildlife in the U.S.? Many European countries?
22. Who is responsible for wildlife management?
23. How are wildlife management agencies organized?
24. How is wildlife management paid for?
25. States and the federal government have management and regulatory authority over different aspects of
wildlife. What are these?
26. What are the main divisions of the FLFWCC? How is the Commission organized above these
divisions?
27. What are the federal Departments with their respective agencies that deal with wildlife?
28. What are the various sources of funding for wildlife conservation? What are the top 2 sources of
funding for most state wildlife agencies?
29. Of what value is wildlife?
30. What is the spiritual danger of not owning a farm?
31. What are the 8 main values of wildlife?
32. What is the economic importance of hunting, fishing, and wildlife recreation to Florida and the U.S.?
33. What are some non-consumptive uses of wildlife? What is their value?
34. If hunting and trapping were completely lost from our culture, what would be the cost?
35. Describe the relationships among people’s perceptions, emotions, cultures, and values regarding
wildlife.
36. Wildlife ethics?
37. Describe Leopold's land ethic and whether it is needed for conservation success.
38. How do births, deaths, immigration, & emigration affect wildlife populations?
39. What affects births, deaths, immigration, & emigration?
40. What is the difference between exponential & logistic population growth?
41. What is Aldo’s model?
42. What is carrying capacity? What are different types?
43. What are patterns of abundance and what controls them?
44. What is metapopulation and how does it relate to wildlife population dynamics and habitat
fragmentation?
45. Define population.
46. Recognize various population models and their components.
47. What are welfare and decimating factors? How do they affect environmental resistance and population
growth?
48. What is a MVP? How is one determined?
49. What are the relationships between nutrition and wildlife populations?
50. What are food components and how does understanding them help us as a wildlife biologist?
51. What are some conservation management practices that will benefit large carnivores in Africa?
52. What is the differences between food use, food digestibility, food availability, & food selection; what
affects these things, and how can I use this information to manage wildlife?
53. How do wildlife get water, how much water do wildlife need, and who cares?
54. What are 7 food components and why are they important to wildlife?
55. What is BMR? How does it relate to wildlife nutrition?
56. What are endotherms, ectotherms, poikilotherms, and homeotherms?
57. Describe the relative energy value of carbo’s, proteins, and fats to wildlife. What are other important
aspects of each of these for wildlife nutrition?
58. What is coprophagy? How does it relate to nutrition?
59. What is the difference between food use, digestibility, availability, accessibility, and selection?
60. How can food use affect habitat?
61. Describe the main digestive system types of various wildlife species.
62. What foraging strategies do Jaguars use? How do jaguars select prey? How does forest structure
influence jaguar and prey spatial and temporal relationships?
63. Why do wildlife need water? What are sources of water? How can we manage water and wildlife?
64. What the different measures of energy in wildlife foods?
65. Why are deer sliding down a brushy hillside?
66. What is cover?
67. What types of cover are there and what are their functions?
68. What factors affect cover selection?
69. How do wildlife use cover differently?
70. What factors affect cover quality and availability?
71. What is a covert?
72. What is an ecological trap and describe an example related to cover?
73. How does being a generalist or specialist relate to cover management?
74. When selecting vegetation as a source of cover, do wildlife typically select the plant species or a
particular growth form?
75. What affects cover requirements for a species?
76. What are the different types of movements?
77. What affects wildlife movements?
78. How do wildlife movements relate to spatial distributions and habitat use?
79. Is space a welfare factor?
80. What is a home range and what affects its size?
81. What is a territory? How do these relate to home ranges? Who has them? Why?
82. How can understanding species dispersal characteristics help us manage better?
83. What are stopover sites and how do they help wildlife?
84. What is short-stopping?
85. What are flyways?
86. What is dispersion and how does knowing something about it help us manage?
87. What are the biological clocks and what sets them?
88. What affects wildlife reproduction?
89. How does reproduction affect population dynamics?
90. What are the different mating habits/systems? How do mating habits affect productivity?
91. How does understanding reproductive physiology & behavior help me as a biologist?
92. Why do we often only consider females when studying or managing wildlife reproduction?
93. What is the difference between fecundity, fertility, natality, and recruitment? Which is the most useful
to determine? Why?
94. Define primary, secondary, tertiary, and quarternary sex ratios. How do these affect population
productivity?
95. How does age affect reproductive performance? How does knowing this help you manage a wildlife
population?
96. What are 8 factors that influence wildlife reproduction? How does each of these affect reproduction?
How can knowing this be used to manage wildlife?
97. Draw an age pyramid for a normal, healthy wildlife population. How might this differ for a population
that had a reproductive failure 2 years ago?
98. Provide examples of the sex ratio needed to maximize productivity for monogamous and polygynous
species.
99. What is the Allee Effect? Draw and label a graph that illustrates this.
100. What value is there in knowing about the reproductive/courtship behaviors of wildlife?
101. List and rank the importance of some environmental cues used by wildlife. What aspects of wildlife
biology and behavior do these affect?
102. Describe the pathway by which space may act as a welfare factor and affect the condition and
reproductive success of wildlife.
103. What is imprinting? How can it be used to manage wildlife?
104. Why is understanding wildlife mortality important?
105. What are the types of mortality?
106. How do different types of mortality interact?
107. What affects wildlife mortality?
108. What is differential vulnerability? How does knowing this help you manage a population? Provide an
example.
109. What is the difference between additive and compensatory forms of mortality?
110. Why do we consider harvest as a special type of mortality?
111. Why do we harvest wildlife?
112. How do harvested and unharvested wildlife populations differ? Why?
113. What is a harvestable surplus?
114. How and why do we regulate the harvest?
115. Why is hunter and trapper education so important?
116. What’s up with PETA?
117. Diagram Type I, II, & III patterns of survival and suggest species or groups of species that follow each
pattern.
118. What is the difference between normal and abnormal forms of wildlife mortality? Which is more of a
management concern? Why?
119. What is the difference between proximate and ultimate forms of mortality? Describe a scenario that
includes both. Which is more difficult to understand? Manage for? Why?
120. Draw a graph that illustrates density-dependent mortality.
121. What is the difference between starvation and malnutrition? What types of animals are more
susceptible to each? Why?
122. What are pros and cons of providing supplemental/artificial food for wildlife?
123. If we must provide supplemental food and control predators for a species to exist or do well, have we
failed as wildlife managers? Why?
124. What is the difference between an enzootic and epizootic disease? Which has greater effects on
wildlife? Why?
125. What are 6 causes of disease?
126. Be able to recognize through matching or fill-in the blank different wildlife diseases and their
descriptions.
127. How does habitat affect wildlife disease issues? Provide an example.
128. How can we diseases and parasites as a management tool? Describe and example.
129. What are some implications of disease control on wildlife and habitat? Provide an example.
130. What are 3 types of accidents for wildlife? Are these normal or abnormal forms of mortality? For
which wildlife are these a significant issue? Why?
131. Describe the 5 types of predation. Which are probably most common? How does this differ from what
many anti-hunting groups might suggest? Why would anti-hunting groups suggest this?
132. What is depredation and how does it differ from predation?
133. Describe the Protective Refugia Principle. How does this relate to the effects of predation, exposure,
and harvest on wildlife?
134. What is the difference between a numeric and functional response of predators to prey?
135. How do predators and predation benefit prey populations? Communities?
136. What impacts do domestic cats have on wildlife? Why is it such a problem?
137. Does predator control work? How do people feel about predator control and various methods used to
control predators?
138. Diagram Leopold’s population model.
139. Which attitude towards wildlife do most hunters have? Anti-hunters? Why?
140. What is Dr. Geist referring to when he says “I hunt no more to kill animals than I garden to kill
cabbages”?
141. Describe the 3 individual motivations that people have to hunt? To which may anti-hunters have the
biggest problem? Why?
142. What stages do hunters typically go through?
143. What are traditional hunters? What is happening to them? Why?
144. Describe the average hunter in terms of sex, age, income, etc.
145. Which segment of society is growing fastest in terms of hunter participation? Why?
146. Why are the numbers of hunters possibly declining?
147. How safe is hunting for hunters? Non-hunters?
148. Will and should hunting continue (your opinion as well as that of society)? Why?
149. Describe the land ethic and the animal rights ethic. How does each relate to hunting? What are pros
and cons of each for wildlife and the environment?
150. What are 4 possible approaches to resolving conflicts between hunters and anti-hunters?
151. What are 4 characteristics of harvested populations?
152. Describe the 3 harvest management principles discussed in class. Which occurs in the real world?
Why?
153. Describe the steps in adaptive harvest management.
154. What is the doomed surplus?
155. What is quality deer management?
156. List and define 4 management strategies/regulations and examples of how they would be used to effect
harvest rates.
157. What is poaching? How can affect wildlife management?
158. List and define Leopold’s Tools.
159. Define common terms related to wildlife habitat.
160. How can soils affect wildlife and can soils be managed? If so, how?
161. What are the components of habitat and why is each important?
162. Why do we need to learn ecological principles?
163. How do we apply what we know about ecological concepts & principles?
164. What is carrying capacity?
165. How does succession affect wildlife habitat?
166. How do soils affect wildlife habitat?
167. What are spatial scales and how do they relate to wildlife habitat?
168. Edge, fragmentation, connectivity, structure, composition, and diversity: how do they affect habitat?
169. What is useable space?
170. How do we manage wildlife habitat?
171. What is an ecological trap?
172. Define habitat, habitat type, vegetation association, habitat use, selection, and availability.
173. What are trophic levels, food chains, and food webs? How do these relate to Leopold’s Land Pyramid?
174. How does the second law of thermodynamics relate to wildlife ecology? How does knowing it help a
manager? Give an example.
175. What is a range of tolerance? Describe an example of how knowing about one helps in management.
176. Define niche. What is the difference between fundamental and realized niches?
177. What are the types and outcomes of competition?
178. Describe primary and secondary succession. Which is more common? Describe a successional
sequence.
179. At what successional stage does wildlife do best?
180. Provide an example illustrating the difference between wildlife habitat use and selection. Which is
more important to understand? Why?
181. Define traditional and Johnson’s levels of selection/scale. Which is better? Why?
182. Define edge and the law of interspersion. How does each affect wildlife?
183. What is the difference between inherent and induced edges? Which is better for wildlife? Why?
184. Define habitat fragmentation, connectivity, interspersion, and juxtaposition, how each is affected by
scale, how each affects wildlife, and how each relates to metapopulation dynamics.
185. Describe the Useable Space Principle through an example. How can it be used in management?
186. Define hard and soft fragmentation. Which is most beneficial to wildlife? Why?
187. Describe the Theory of Island Biogeography and provide an example of its application to management
of spotted owls.
188. What is an ecological trap? Provide a specific example.
189. What are 4 things that habitat management can do to wildlife population dynamics?
190. Habitat management is the manipulation of?
191. According to Rollins & Carroll (Predation on Quail paper), what impacts do predators have on quail
and what do they prose as a method of increasing quail numbers (be specific)?
192. Why is density a misleading indicator of habitat quality for wildlife (provide at least 3 reasons)?
193. What is the principle of inversity? Use a detailed example to illustrate how knowing this can be
applied to manage a population.
194. Describe the community-based conservation approach to protecting howler monkeys in Belize.
Compare and contrast this approach to simply managing them on public lands such as a national park.
195. How might habitat management differ between single species and community approaches?
196. How might global climate change influence wildlife distributions and habitat management at large
scales?
197. What is a Landscape Conservation Cooperative? How does it affect wildlife?
198. What are the historical and contemporary relationships between wildlife and agricultural practices?
199. What are the types of farmland habitat and how do they affect wildlife?
200. What are the pros and cons of various farmland management practices?
201. Can farms and wildlife coexist?
202. How have populations of farmland- and forest-associated wildlife species changed in the eastern U.S.
since European settlement?
203. What are characteristics of U.S. farms that have changed during the past half-century?
204. What are differences among conventional-tillage, reduced-tillage, and no-tillage practices and how do
these affect wildlife?
205. Describe a scenario where tilled fields may be an ecological trap.
206. What is crop rotation and how can it benefit wildlife and habitat?
207. What are cover crops and how do they benefit wildlife and soils?
208. Describe/design the “perfect” farm for wildlife that is still able to produce agricultural commodities.
209. What is organic farming? How does it differ from traditional farming? Are chemicals used? What are
benefits for wildlife?
210. Describe contour and strip farming and their benefits to wildlife and the farmer.
211. What are field borders and how are these important to wildlife?
212. How are border-edge cuts created and how do they affect wildlife and the landowners?
213. What is a lure crop?
214. What are food plots and how might they be used in farm and forest land management?
215. Of what value are odd areas and linear habitats? How are they created and maintained?
216. What are warm-season grasses and why are they valuable to wildlife in pasture and hayfields?
217. Describe some practices to better manage streams, ponds, and wetlands in farmlands.
218. What affects do agricultural chemicals have on wildlife, directly and indirectly?
219. Describe current Farm Bill programs that benefit wildlife in farmlands and who administers each.
220. What is IPM and how can it benefit wildlife?
221. How can crop irrigation both help and hurt wildlife and their habitat?
222. What are wildlife- and natural resources-related programs within the current farm bill? How do they
work and benefit wildlife? Who administers each of the programs?
223. Should we be concerned about declines in most farmland wildlife species?
224. Should farmlands be ecological sacrifice? Why?
225. What is “clean” farming?
226. How can agriculture help biodiversity in East Africa?
227. What is the source/sink paradigm as it relates to the impacts of faming on agriculture?
228. What are “set-aside” programs as they relate to agriculture?
229. What are rangelands and why are they so important to wildlife?
230. What are the major wildlife problems in rangelands and how can we solve them?
231. What is an animal unit?
232. Fire, grazing, fencing, water, livestock, and wildlife: how do they interact?
233. What are some rangeland management techniques?
234. What are the 4 major types of rangelands? Briefly describe each.
235. What does range condition refer to? What is the relationship among range condition, wildlife habitat,
animal units, and plants such as increasers, decreasers, and invaders?
236. Describe 5 mechanical rangeland treatment techniques and their benefits to wildlife.
237. Discuss the importance of fire to rangeland communities.
238. What rangeland communities are in Florida?
239. How does grazing influence wildlife?
240. How do fencing and browsing interact to affect elephants and other wildlife in southern Africa?
241. What are 5 considerations when thinking about a grazing management program?
242. Describe strategic and environmental protective grazing.
243. What are 2 primary grazing management systems, how do they work, and what affect do they have on
wildlife?
244. Describe the impacts of grazing and fire on the 4 primary rangeland types.
245. What is the predominant Florida rangeland type?
246. How might we control and manage saw-palmetto on Florida rangelands?
247. What are fencing issues in rangelands, why are they so prevalent, and how might they be mitigated?
248. How can grazing be used to manage habitat for quail on Florida’s rangelands?
249. What is improved pasture? Is it good for wildlife? Why?
250. Which federal agencies manage most public rangelands?
251. What are grazing fees and why are they an issue?
252. What are the major forest types, how do they differ, and how do they relate to wildlife populations?
253. How do forest structure and composition affect wildlife?
254. What are the pros and cons of forest management practices for wildlife?
255. How does forest ownership (private v. public) affect wildlife management?
256. How have forests and their management changed?
257. What are the major issues related to forests & wildlife?
258. What differentiates rangelands from forests?
259. What are 5 major forest types of North America? Southeast?
260. What are the trends in major forest types of the Southeast during the past ~60 years?
261. How might timber extraction be used to conserve wildlife in tropical forests? Is timber extraction
necessary for wildlife conservation in tropical forests?
262. What is commercial forest? How much of the U.S. and Southeast is commercial?
263. Public or private, which controls most of the forest land in the U.S. and Southeast?
264. Which FL state and federal agencies manage most of the public forestlands?
265. What are several commonly produced forest products?
266. Describe 5 forest and wildlife management issues?
267. How does ownership impact the management of forests and its value to wildlife?
268. What is silviculture? What are the 3 main components?
269. Describe the 2 primary forest harvest management techniques, the methods within each, and the benefit
of each to wildlife.
270. How are forest stands regenerated following harvest? How does each affect wildlife?
271. What are common timber stand improvement methods and how do they affect wildlife?
272. What are some special habitat features in forests, how do they affect wildlife, and how do conventional
forest management practices affect them?
273. Right-of-ways, log-landings, and other open areas: of what benefit are these to wildlife and how can
they be managed?
274. Old growth forest and fire are big issues in forest management. Why?
275. How might we manage forests to enhance the value of remaining old growth tracts?
276. Of what value are tree plantations for wildlife? Why?
277. Describe several current Farm Bill programs that benefit forestlands and their wildlife.
278. Describe 3 pieces of legislation and their affects on forest management and wildlife.
279. What is mast? How can we manage a forest for more of it?
280. How does wildlife management in parks and refuges differ?
281. What are unique problems and opportunities for managing wildlife in parks?
282. What are National Forests, what issues do they have, and who manages them?
283. How do different types of parks differ in wildlife management?
284. What is transfrontier park?
285. What are 5 common problems associated with National Parks? Refuges?
286. What are the 2 pieces of legislation that provided guidance and a mission for National Wildlife
Refuges?
287. What federal entities manage National Wildlife Refuges? National Seashores? Rangeland systems?
288. Can “good” wildlife really live in cities?
289. Where is the habitat within cities?
290. What are the unique challenges to managing wildlife in urban and suburban areas?
291. Why can some species thrive in urban settings while others can not?
292. What impacts do roads have on wildlife? Habitat?
293. Will we ever solve urban & suburban wildlife problems?
294. Of what importance are urban areas to wildlife conservation?
295. What are urban avoiders, adapters, and exploiters?
296. What is an urban-rural gradient?
297. What is synurbanization?
298. What are some unique aspects of urban environments?
299. Why do some species do so well in urban areas? Suburbs?
300. What are the primary difficulties and issues with managing wildlife in urban and suburban areas?
301. How is wildlife management different between urban and rural/wilderness areas?
302. What is the traditional focus of wildlife management in cities?
303. What are current issues as well as future trends and challenges in urban wildlife management?
304. What are some techniques for managing nuisance wildlife in cities?
305. What is a wetland?
306. What are the different types of wetlands?
307. Why are wetlands important to wildlife?
308. What has happened to wetland habitats?
309. How can we manage wetland habitats?
310. Regarding wetlands and open water habitats, what are the systems, subsystems, and classes?
311. Name and locate 5 major wetland complexes of importance to wildlife in North America?
312. How much wetland remains in the world? U.S., Florida?
313. What is the leading cause of wetland loss and degradation? What are 5 other causes?
314. What are 5 factors to consider when examining wetland function?
315. Of what value are wetlands to people and wildlife?
316. What is moist soil management? Green tree reservoir?
317. What are the 3 primary components to consider when creating, restoring, or managing a wetland?
318. What are 4 pieces of legislation that relate to wetlands? How does each relate to wetlands?
319. What is the history of attitudes towards wetland?
320. What are the different types of coastal and island habitats?
321. Why are coastal and island habitats so important to wildlife? Society?
322. What have happened to island and coastal habitats?
323. How can we manage island and coastal habitats?
324. What is the Gulf Dead Zone and what caused it?
325. Describe a piece of legislation related to the management of coastal zones?
326. What is vertical accretion and how does it affect wetlands and coastal habitats?
327. What makes a species exotic? Invasive?
328. Why have exotic wildlife been released?
329. How do exotic and invasive species affect native wildlife?
330. Why have we failed so often in dealing with exotic species?
331. How can we control problems associated with exotic species?
332. What are the pros & cons of wildlife farms and hunting preserves?
333. What are reasons for failure of introductions?
334. What areas are more vulnerable to being invaded by an exotic species? Why?
335. What costs are associated with exotic wildlife?
336. How does management of rare, threatened, & endangered species differ from that of common species?
337. What are mandates/legislation for endangered species conservation?
338. What is recovery planning & does it work?
339. Define endangered species?
340. What are 5 factors leading to extinction or endangered status?
341. What makes a species prone to extinction?
342. Where are endangered species listed at the U.S. national level? International level?
343. What are the Red Data Books?
344. Who can propose a species for listing or delisting?
345. Describe the triage approach to endangered species management?
346. What is a safe harbor agreement and how can it improve endangered species management?
347. What is CITES?
348. What is a PVA and how does it relate to endangered species conservation?
349. Who cares?
350. How does any of this help me as a wildlife biologist?
351. How can I use all of this information to better manage wildlife?
352. Why is Leopold’s land ethic only half a loaf?