• To provide the students an insight into the field of Aquatic Ecology
• To provide them the advanced  information on General Ecology and Aquatic Environments.
• Introducing the students to current issues and recent advances on Aquatic Fauna and its relationship to the environment.
• Introducing them to the idea of biomonitoring the aquatic environment and Research methodologies used in Aquatic Ecology.

•Introduction to ecology

•Individuals’  ecology

–Organisms limiting factors

–Important abiotic factors

•Population ecology

–Structure and  diversity

–Biomass system

–Population regulation

–Interspecific competition

•Community and ecosystem ecology

–Zoogeography

–Aquatic ecological zones and ecosystems in Saudi Arabia

–Ecological relationship between plankton and Nekton in marine, freshwater, and eustraine habitats.

–Effects of ecological factors on aquatic animals and their media

Course contents:

Zoo 374   Aquatic Ecology   2 (1+1)  

Introduction; properties of the aquatic environment; characteristics: physical characteristics (temperature, salinity, transparency and turbidity); chemical characteristics (dissolved oxygen, other dissolved gases, pH and hardness); aquatic ecosystem: aquatic plants and animals. 

An Introduction to animal behavior and types of behavior. Foraging behavior and different regimes. Behavioral physiological adaptations. Animal behavior and applied Pharmacology. The role of animal behavior in biomedical studies. Biological rhythm, homing and migration. Animal communication. Applications of Pavlov experiments. Biological control. The role of nervous system in behavior. 2+0

The main objective of the course is to introduce the students to Aquaculture w.r.t Fish farming in particular. To provide students with basic and current information on Aquaculture :Fish Culture  status worldwide as well as regional. To update them with recent trends in  Aquaculture t: Global and Regional(Saudi Arabia). 1+1

Introduction, Fisheries and Food security, Development of Fisheries , Importance and superiority of fish protein, Fisheries of Saudi Arabia, Present and Future.