EVE 16: Wild Davis

Any literature searching for a specific organism requires searching not only by the common name (if there is one) but also by the scientific name.

For example, the best search for this important California raptor is:

”california condor*” OR “gymnogyps californian*”

A quick way to find a scientific name when literature searching is to limit your common name search to the TITLE field and then to scan the titles of the results.  Scientific practice for article titles is to list the common name first and then list the scientific name in parentheses. BIOSIS Previews and Zoological Record both have excellent taxonomic indexing so you can also look at the individual article record and scan down to the taxonomic table which will show the genus species in the last (far right) column.

"Get it at UC" Button

Most databases provide a description of articles and other resources to help you find what you need by searching through the indexed literature within their website. Included as part of the item record is the “Get it at UC”  button. Clicking this button will direct you to a copy of the full text of the article. 

Interlibrary Loan Request

If we do not own a journal or book, you can submit an interlibrary loan (ILL) request to have the book or article (e)mailed to you for free from another UC library. Learn more about how to request books or articles.

How to Choose a Database

In deciding which database(s) to use, it is helpful to note:

• Who: Who is authoring these publications? Are these scholarly, popular, or industry sources?
• What: What can I find in the database? (e.g. articles, conference proceedings, data)
• When: When does coverage begin? How well is historical literature covered? Does it include articles published in the last year?
• Where: What is the geographical scope of the coverage? Does that match your research interest?

NOTE:  Your database comparison table distributed in the class (and also to be available from your Canvas class site) helps with locating the above criteria for four of the key databases for finding animal-related literature:   BIOSIS Previews, Zoological Record, ASFA & Fish, Fisheries and Aquatic Biodiversity.

Recommended Subject Databases:

Below are listed very broad databases which include organismal physiology, ecology or behavior literature (BIOSIS Previews), to specialized databases concerning wildlife (Zoological Record and Wildlife & Ecology Studies Worldwide).