the reference sign

Sylvia pointed out that I had accidentally put the J-term schedule sign up on our high-tech wooden sign holder. I stashed it in the drawer.

Then I decided to also stash the sign that just says "reference librarian" because a focus group pointed out that students only know when librarians are available when we're not available. We decided to keep the sign with the hours up all the time.

So that's why, if you're wondering.

EEB lab assignment

Michelle has left the Ecology, Evolution and Behavior lab assignment at the reference desk. There are two parts to be aware of. The first part, due next week, asks them to explore journals and books in the library. The journals exploration piece is particularly confusing - it suggests they search a topic in CSA, then find two articles that are here in both print and electronic versions. This could take hours - but if they search CSA and include a limiter by source to one of the few journals that we have in both formats, they can streamline the process.

The journals we get in print are available here. Some titles I've checked are -

• American Journal of Botany
• American Midland Naturalist (most recent four months not available online)
• Animal Behaviour
• Ecology
• Ecological Monographs
• Plant Physiology (most recent year not available online)

So I would suggest doing a search limited to one of these titles as a source and then picking an online and print article to view. Sounds like cheating, but it beats going nuts.

The other part, also due next week, involves looking up books on ecology, evolution, or behavior and that just means searching MnPALS and looking for books shelved in the Qs.

The third part, a literature review, is due March 7th and will probably involve a flurry of activity on March 6th.