Field and Laboratory Methods in Primatology: A Practical Guide

by Deborah J. Curtis (Editor)

Including valuable advice for those planning a field study, this practical manual for students and researchers studying wild primates provides essential information concerning the technical and practical aspects of field and laboratory methods. The study covers surveys and habituation, remote sensing and GPS, tracking and trapping, non-invasive genetic and endocrine assays, and ethical issues. It will be appropriate for final year undergraduates, postgraduate students and researchers in primatology, behavioral ecology and zoology.

372 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2003

Reviews

[Wendelle · Rating 5 out of 5]

An essential companion for scientific exploration, and guide that conveys the excitement of field research to romantic armchair explorers. First, it conveys the significance of planning for data collection, statistical analysis, habitat and climate preparation, and preparation for local cultural context before one leaves for the field. Second, it conveys the wide array of choices in methodology when conducting one's research: choices between tracking or capture-tag-recapture, vegetation statistical estimates or fruit trail evidence, choices in trapping methods, choices in anesthesia methods, varieties of estimating arthropod abundance and dietary ecology through direct collection and indirect methods like fecal abundance or tree sampling, varieties in GPS and GIS methods, varieties in measurement methods of primate morphology, choices in method of preservation of animal artifacts like bones, skin, skulls, teeth, feces, and tracks, choices in sound recording of primate vocalization and photo recording of animals, etc. that all make for new research publications or new ways of attacking a topic.