Anyone here in the career of Ecology?

Post Reply New Topic

Well, the title states my question; if you are, please could you relay some in sight towards a high schooler, as to your coming in this feild? I'm really intrested in it and find my self with an urge to fufill my dream, what are the courses you took? What basic courses should i take, just as an aid in my life as an Ecologist?What other degree should i take that help with and in Ecology?

Well, I'm not in an ecology career, but I have done courses that could have led to one.

To get into Ecology you'll need.
Biology based courses with an ecology component.
Or specialised Ecology courses.
I'm not sure what's available in your country, but you might want to consider whether you want the option of shifting focus later on by doing a broader biology based course.

After having taken an Advanced Biology Course myself, a word of warning: Ecology involves being outside usually in a muddy field with a quad-rat or kick sampling invertebrates from a murky river bed or doing mark release recapture with slimy snails. It also in my experience involves people arguing and lots rain. I hope that the climate is better and drier where you are.

You have to be able to tolerate residential courses and share living space with lots of other people in the beginning. There's lots of fieldwork and probably a substantial assessed fieldwork component.

Expect communal shower facilities, shared dorms or in extreme cases tents.

I've been on field-trips where there have been up to about 10 people in a dorm for a week with no privacy. These trips have pushed me to the absolute limit. The over-stimulation and overcrowding has in some cases led to me not completing some of the work. It can be distressing and stressful. On the courses I went on, group work was a mandatory component and I had to be able to negotiate and exchange my results with other people.

The more remote and beautiful the environment you're studying, usually, the further away it will be from public amenities and civilization!

Proper equipment is essential: sturdy walking boots, wellington boots, waterproof trousers, large backpack, compass, sun hat, insect repellant, First Aid Kit and so on...
Be prepared to spend money on equipment and take a change of clothes.

Good organisation and record keeping skills are essential.

Expect bites and scratches from the local fauna and flora.

The trips will be subsidised, but be prepared to make a contribution yourself.

Expect to be put on a First Aid Course and do some risk assessments.
Be prepared for illness, things not going as planned etc.

Invest in a good clipboard and a see through plastic bag so you can write in the rain.
Specialised clipboards are also available with a kind of see through plastic "tent" to keep out the rain.

Field work can be great fun, you've just got to watch that the social component doesn't drain you to the point of snapping.

Another thing about Ecology: it's not just all bird song and butterflies, there's a data analysis component: that means Math!

A basic Statistics or Applied Math course, I've found helped me a lot with my Biology Course.
It might even be a mandatory requirement for some Ecology courses so check before applying.

Statistical methods for data analysis that will be useful include:

-Chi-squared test

-Student's t-test


Being familiar with the concepts of "degrees of freedom" or "confidence", will help a lot.
Also types of sampling: stratified, random, quota etc.

Expect to analyse and plot a lot of data.
That means drawing graphs: histograms, scatter-graphs, pie charts, box and whisker plots etc.

I thoroughly recommend that you familiarise yourself with all the graph drawing tools in Excel and the Stats formulas. Getting proficient at Excel will help a lot.

Also expect algebraic equations such as the "Lincoln–Petersen method" (it estimates the number of organisms present in an environment using a simple ratio found using the "mark release recapture" technique).


And biological keys, you'll be using those a lot.

I hope this helped a bit.
I hope I haven't put you off.
All the best for the future.

Thank you for all of the knowledge you have shared with me, and yes i do relize that there will be math involved, i love math, and science so i figured this would work pretty well with me