The course will survey the biology of amphibians and reptiles from systematic to community ecology. The areas to be covered include systematics, biogeography, population and community ecology and behavior and physiology. Global diversity shall be emphasized.

Given the mounting evidence of global decline of “herptiles”, a general analysis of amphibian and reptileconservation and management shall be carried out. Laboratory work shall emphasize identification techniques and methods used for sampling reptile and amphibian populations.