Research Guides: Ecology and Wildlife Biology Research Guide: Home

Start Here / Best Databases

Web of Science
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Indexes the world's leading peer reviewed journal literature in the sciences, social sciences, arts, and humanities and provides searching of cited references, from 1900-present.

Google Scholar
Scholarly literature across many disciplines and sources.

Other Relevant Databases

For an outline of a comprehensive science literature review, click here: Science Literature Review.

For tips on improving database search results, click here: Improving Database Search Results.

Suggested databases:

Academic Search Complete
Full text scholarly journal, trade publication, magazine and newspaper articles, books, book reviews, reports, and Associated Press video content, covering all subject areas.
AGRICOLA
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Index to journal articles, monographs, proceedings, theses, patents, translations, audiovisual materials, computer software, technical reports, U.S. Bureau of Land Management and U.S. Forest Service literature, and printed works dating back to the 15th century. Subjects include agriculture, botany, forestry, grazing, and range management. Produced by the National Agricultural Library.
PubMed
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Indexes MEDLINE, a database of scholarly journal articles in the life sciences with a focus on biomedicine, and additional life science journals and online books. Fields include behavioral sciences, chemical sciences, and bioengineering. Produced by the U.S. National Library of Medicine. **Note: PubMed is live with a new interface as of mid-May 2020. Go to this link to learn more about the new web experience.

Science.gov
Gateway to U.S. government science information.
SORA
Searchable Ornithological Research Archive.

Wildlife & Ecology Studies Worldwide
Index to scholarly journal and magazine articles, books, conference papers, reports, and dissertations about wild mammals, birds, reptiles and amphibians, including studies on individual species, habitat types, wildlife behavior, and ecotourism and zoology, from 1892-present.

Journals

Search specialized journals when looking for articles on your research topic. Some suggested browsing examples to look at are: American Naturalist; Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics; Auk; Canadian Journal of Zoology; Condor; Conservation Biology; Ecological Applications; Ecological Monographs; Ecology; Evolution; Journal of Animal Ecology; Journal of Evolutionary Biology; Journal of Mammalogy; Journal of Wildlife Management; Oikos; Trends in Ecology & Evolution; Wildlife Society Bulletin; Wildlife Monographs.

To browse journal titles, click here: Mansfield Library Journals.

Browse or search ejournal packages (NOTE: Some allow keyword searching of article full text):

Annual Reviews
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Full text journal review articles synthesizing current research and understandings in science and social science disciplines. Complete archives-present provided for most AR titles.
BioOne Complete
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Full text of over 200 journals in the biological, ecological, and environmental sciences.
JSTOR
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Full text archive of over 2,600 scholarly journals and 5,000 open source books covering all subject areas. Embargo for current journal issues of 2-5 years. NOTE: The library's holdings do not include primary source collections or fee-based books.
ScienceDirect
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Full text of 2,500 scholarly journals and over 3,000 book series volumes and reference works, published by Elsevier in the fields of health sciences, life sciences, physical sciences & engineering, and the social sciences & humanities. Library licenses most ScienceDirect journals offered, including archival content dating back to volume 1 for many titles. Other than volumes published as part of book series, the library has minimal licensed books. NOTE: The download pdf links are currently not working properly in all cases. As a workaround, tick the box before the article title that you want to download and click 'Download articles'. A Zip file will be downloaded containing the PDF.
Springer
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Full text of over 50,000 scholarly e-books published by Springer 2005-2015, and over 2,200 current e-journals, with coverage dating back to volume 1 for many titles. Subjects include: biomedicine; business and management; chemistry; computer science; earth sciences; economics; education; engineering; geography; history; law; life sciences; literature; materials science; mathematics; medicine & public health; pharmacy; philosophy; physics; political science and international relations; psychology; social sciences; statistics. NOTE: Deselect 'Include Preview-Only' from the top of a subject or content page to limit browsing to titles licensed by the library.
Wildlife Society E-journals
Full text of Society scholarly journals and practitioner magazine covering the biology and ecology of wildlife; management and conservation of wildlife; and policy issues, education, administration, law enforcement, and review articles on the philosophy and history of wildlife management and conservation.
Wiley Online Library
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Full text of over 1,600 e-journals covering life, health and physical sciences, social science, and the humanities. Coverage is generally 1997-present. The library does not license all content offered on the Wiley site. The 'Full Access' lock icon denotes content available to UM users

For an explanation of popular vs. scholarly (magazines versus research journals), click here: Popular vs. Scholarly.

For an explanation of peer review, click here: Peer Review in 5 Minutes.

To evaluate, compare, and rank journals using citation data, click on Journal Citation Reports or Scimago.

Journal Citation Reports
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Resource tool for journal evaluation, using citation data drawn from over 11,000 journals dating back to 1997 and includes virtually all specialties in the areas of science, technology, and social sciences. Shows journal impact factors, highest impact journals, most frequently used journals, hottest journals and largest journals.

Book Catalogs

Biodiversity Heritage Library
Digitized, historic natural history literature.

WorldCat (Discovery)
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Catalog of library resources held by institutions around the world. Find materials and place interlibrary loan requests for resources not owned locally.

WorldCat on the former FirstSearch platform is available from http://libguides.lib.umt.edu/worldcat-firstsearch

Google Book Search
Snippet and full-text views of books as they are scanned by the Google Book Project.

OneSearch
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The search engine for materials owned by the library, both on the shelf and online. Also provides millions of full text article and citation records harvested from publishers, open access repositories, and a large percentage of the library's licensed databases. Click here to view a list of databases with content not findable or only partially findable in OneSearch.

Tip: Remember to check "Include Results without Full Text" in the left-hand facets of OneSearch to expand your results set to citations matching your research interests; full-text can be acquired through interlibrary loan and delivered to you free of charge in a short amount of time.

For a detailed view of Dewey Decimal call numbers, click on: Dewey Decimal Classification Summaries.

Dictionaries, Encyclopedias and Handbooks

Credo Reference
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Continuously updated full text collection of over 880 general and subject specific titles from 116 publishers with particular emphasis on encyclopedias, dictionaries, atlases, and reference handbooks.

Birds of the World - Comprehensive life histories for all bird species and families
Dictionary of Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics (570.3 L738)
Encyclopedia of Animal Behavior - Online encyclopedia
Encyclopedia of Ecology - Encyclopedia of general and applied ecology
Encyclopedia of Entomology
Encyclopedia of Evolution (576.803 E5641)
Encyclopedia of Genetics (576.5 E5642)
Encyclopedia of Life - Information about all known species on earth
Encyclopedia of Molecular Biology (572.8 C914e)
Encyclopedia of Theoretical Ecology (577.03 E5648 Lvl 5 Q Oversize)
Endangered Species - U.S. - Information from the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service
Global Biodiversity: Status... (333.9511 G562)
Guide to Reference and Information Sources in the Zoological Sciences (590 X S3497g)
The Encyclopedia of Biodiversity. Second Edition - Online encyclopedia
Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive
The Literature of Wildlife - A library guide
Wikipedia - An encyclopedia that is written & edited anonymously & collaboratively

Grants and Funding Sources

Foundation Directory Online
Directory of 108,000 foundations, corporate giving programs and grant-making public charities in the U.S.; a database of three million recently awarded grants; and a database of one million recently filed IRS forms 990 and 990-PF.
Foundation Grants to Individuals
Directory of close to 10,000 foundation and public charity programs that fund students, artists, researchers, and other individual grant seekers. Covers scholarships, fellowships, loans, and internships; awards, prizes, and grants by nomination; research and professional support; and general welfare and special needs.

National Science Foundation Award Search

Legal, Legislative and News Information Sources

Access World News: Research Collection
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Full text current and archived articles from U.S. and global news sources. Date coverage varies with individual newspaper.
Environment & Energy Publishing (E&E News)
Full text of five daily publications from E&E News, a news organization focusing on energy and environment issues at the federal policy level and around the nation. Titles include Energywire, Climatewire, E&E Daily, Greenwire, and E&E News PM, from 3 years ago-present. Also provides Land Letter, published 2009-2012.
HeinOnline
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Full text law journals and full runs of the Federal Register, Statutes at Large, presidential documents, the Congressional Record, and Supreme Court opinions. Access provided by the UM Law School.
LexisNexis Academic (now called Nexis Uni)
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Full text content from more than 15,000 news, legal, and business sources. Includes print and online journals, television and radio broadcasts, newswires and blogs, as well as local, regional, national and international newspapers, legal sources for federal and state cases and statutes, business information on U.S. and international companies and executives.
U.S. Congressional (ProQuest Congressional)
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Index to primary source congressional documents, from 1789-present.

Web Sites - Search Engines

Some suggested search engines are:

Web Sites - Meta Sites & Directories

Citation Guides

Here are some resources to help you manage your bibliographies:

RefWorks
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Web-based bibliographic research management, writing, and collaboration tool. Designed for researchers to gather, organize, store and share all types of information and to generate formatted citations and bibliographies.

Users may continue to access the Legacy version of RefWorks from here. As the Legacy version is tentatively scheduled to be retired at some future date, we recommend new users register for the new RefWorks and current Legacy users begin planning to migrate to the new interface. Click to learn more.

Legacy users may select the Move to the newest version of RefWorks from ProQuest link in the legacy platform should they wish to create an account on the new RefWorks and copy data to the new version at the same time.

Related Library Guides

Cellular & Molecular Biology, Genetics, Microbiology (includes Toxicology)

Conservation Genetics

Environmental and Natural Resources Databases - Arranged by Topic

Environmental Studies

Fire Management

Forest Management

Geosciences (includes Climatology)

Maps

Recreation Management & Wilderness Studies

Need Help?

Barry Brown

Email Me

Contact:

Barry Brown

Science Librarian

Head, Access & Collection Services

Mansfield Library, The University of Montana

32 Campus Drive. #9936

Missoula, MT 59812-9936

406-243-6811; Office ML 327

Subjects:Biological Sciences, Chemistry & Biochemistry, Computer Science, Ecosystem and Conservation Sciences, Environmental Studies, Forest Management, Geosciences, Mathematical Sciences, Physics and Astronomy, Resource Conservation, Society and Conservation, Wildlife Biology

Maureen and Mike Mansfield Library

Ecology and Wildlife Biology Research Guide: Home