Wildlife Information Sources and Search Methods on the Internet
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WILDLIFE INFORMATION SOURCES AND SEARCH METHODS ON THE INTERNET DIANA L. DWYER, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, National Wildlife Research Center, 1201 Oakridge Drive, Fort Collins, Colorado 80525. ABSTRACT: Vertebrate pest damage information is pulled from a variety of disciplines ranging from wildlife management to psychology. The Internet has opened the door to what seems to be an unending number of information sources. Researchers can become overwhelmed by the choices and different levels of information available. The correct use of search engines and a checklist of criteria to evaluate the quality of information obtained can help to eliminate the extraneous infonnation and make the time spent on the Internet more productive. There are a large number of wildlife, biology, environmental, and other related sites that are especially useful to the wildlife damage management community. KEY WORDS: Internet, search engines, wildlife damage, information sources Proc. 18th Vertcbr. Pest Conf. (R.0. Baker & A.C. Crabb, Eds.) Published at Univ. of Calif., Davis. 1998. INTRODUCTION com) is the most current search engine at the time of this Vertebrate pest control research, by its very nature, publication, reindexing its database every two weeks. is an aggregate of numerous disciplines-wildlife biology, Hotbot allows you to use boolean logic and searches both ecology, zoology, bioelectronics, chemistry, botany, the Web and Usenet which greatly expands its search computer science, psychology, statistics, etc. This mosaic results (Hock 1997). Special features include using a makes the work fascinating-information is pulled from search modifier that searches for pages that have changed many of these disciplines to find solutions to pest control since you last used the program or within a specific time problems. But what makes it fascinating also makes period, and the option to save searches for later use. finding the infonnati .on difficult. The Internet provides Hotbot also has a great feature that lets you search to a access to thousands of web sites that support the wildlife specific depth in a page. This is important when you are damage community and makes them readily accessible to digging for information that could be buried on the fourth users around the world. level of a web page (Haskin 1997). Northern Light (http://www.northernlight.com) is the newest search Access to the Internet engine on the web. Designed by librarians, it searches Obtaining an Internet account and password has both the web and a database of more than 1,500 full-text become fairly straightforward even in remote areas of the journal titles. Search results are organized into folders world. Many companies and universities maintain that are sorted by subject, type, source, and language. A Internet links that are available to staff. Internet service unique feature in Northern Light allows you to order any providers (ISP) are listed in the yellow pages under articles directly from them by e-mail for a reasonable cost "Internet Products & Services" and offer a wide range of (Notess 1998). service options. Public libraries now offer Internet access Separate news searchers are an excellent source for to patrons and are also a good source for training classes finding more up-to-date news stories in both regional, and online help. national, and international newspapers. They are updated throughout the day which puts them weeks ahead of Search Engines and Directories regular search engines, and they focus specifically on It is easy to be overwhelmed by the amount of news stories. Excite NewsTracker (http://nt.excite.com) information on the web. Using search engines properly has the most extensive and powerful news database with will help to eliminate false leads and extraneous material. more than 300 publications indexed. NewsTracker has Over 260 search engines are indexed on My Virtual boolean searching and a special feature that tracks high Reference Desk (http://www.refdesk.com) a web page interest stories. Newsbot (http://www.newbot.com) is that ties together all of the search and reference tools. one of the more powerful news searchers currently True search engines like Hotbot, Alta Vista, and Northern available. Supplied by the Reuters News Service, Light scan the web for word or phrase matches that are Newsbot allows full-text searching of articles, customized identified by computer robots or spiders. These are user profiles, and free downloading of articles (O'Leary computer indexing routines that index major words in a 1997b). Yahoo! and Infoseek also search the news wires web page. Web directories like Yahoo! (http://www. on a more limited basis. Yahoo! stores articles for seven yahoo.com), WebCrawler (www.webcrawler.com), or days, and InfoSeek does not have a browsing function OpenText (www.opentext.com) are indexed by people which limits searching results. who review the information and arrange it hierarchically Important information also lies with the personal (Lidsky 1997; Bell 1997). Yahool's strength is in its knowledge and capabilities of biologists and technicians content and coverage. If you are looking for the working in the field. Finding people on the web is easy Colorado State University web page, Yahoo! indexes it using · search utilities like WhoWhere (http://www. under "Regional: U.S. States:Colorado:Education:College whowhere.com), InfoSpace (http://www.infospace.com) and Univerisities:Public." Hotbot (http://www.hotbot. which will give you a map right to the location, and 416 Fourll (http://www.fourll.com) which will make the Wildlife Damage Links. The United States telephone call if you have the equipment on your Department of Agriculture's National Wildlife Research computer (Bell 1997). Center (http://www.aphis.usda.gov/ws/nwrc) web page offers information on current Center research, Search Criteria publications, and contact numbers. You can contact the It is very easy to find information on the Internet. NWRC library directly for copies of all publications Unfortunately, many searches result in hundreds, if not produced by Center scientists. The Jack P. Berryman thousands, of hits. The real trick is to find something that Institute for Wildlife Damage Management (http://sticky. is relevant to your search topic. Listed below are some usu.edu/ -cnr/fishwild/berry. htm) is the main web page specific things you can do to make your search time more for Utah State University's wildlife damage program. It productive. links to Keeping Wildlife At a Safe Distance (http://cc. 1) Be specific in your search and beware of search terms usu.edu/ -schrnidt/welcome.html), an excellent source for that may have a double meaning. Using the term information on wildlife damage resources, government "bears" will find articles on black bears and the agencies, legislation, and how-to publications on wildlife Chicago Bears football team! Urus americanus will damage. There is also a link to the Wildlife Damage find sites directly related to the animal. Listserv. TEXNAT(http://texnat.tamu.edu/atexnat.btm), 2) If you cannot be precise, use search engines like the Texas Natural Resource Web maintained by Texas Northern Light or lnfoseek that make it easy to refine A&M University focuses on natural resources in Texas. your initial search. Information includes research and extension publications, 3) Specialized search engines may give you better results management tips, educational programs, and symposium than the big search engines. proceedings. Publications include the "Predation Guide" 4) Pick a search engine that you like and learn how to (http://texnat.tamu.edu/ranchref/predator), adapted from use it. Each product has special features and tools "Procedures for Evaluating Predation on Livestock and that make searching much more powerful (Haskin Wildlife" by Wade and Bowns, "Coyotes in the 1997). Southwest" and "Feral Swine: a Compendium for S) Learn how to use Boolean logic-it will help in Resource Managers." North Dakota State University's refining your searches. "Coyote and Yellowstone" excellent guide, "Prevention & Control of Wildlife will find hits that include both terms; "Coyote or Damage" can be found on the North Carolina Natural Yellowstone" will find hits that have either tenn; Resourceswebpage(http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/nreos/wild/ "Coyote and Yellowstone not wolves" will find pages wildlife.html). Rutgers' Cook College Wildlife Damage that include coyotes, Yellowstone, but not wolves. Control Center (http ://cook-college. rutgers. edu/wwwI 6) Do broad searches using several search engines or a cent-inst/wildlife.html) lists faculty names and contact meta search engine that taps into a variety of sources. numbers. The Anned Forces Pest Management Board (http://www-afpmb.acq.osd.mil) offers information on As with all reference sources, you should rely on the various pest control projects on military bases information from reputable sources. If you have a and publications. The Human Dimensions Research Unit question about where something you found on the web (http://www.hdru.cornell.edu) at Cornell University came from, call the Webmaster to verify the source includes the full text of reports done by the unit on (Clark 1997). human-wildlife conflicts. State Wildlife Links. State and regional information Wildlife Damage Websites can be found at the extension service, experiment stations, Aquaculture. Aquaculture farms have grown in and university sites. Pages that include wildlife damage number over the past