<p>
	<img alt="" src="{filedir_5}CTCYL_AB1(2).png" style="float: right;" />Water is a mysterious world, yet foundational to all life and every biological community. For many people, even scientists and students of biology, the lakes, streams, and bogs of northern Michigan seem, on first inspection, difficult to investigate. Au Sable&rsquo;s course in <em>Aquatic Biology </em>opens the door to that investigation, exploring these fascinating environments that compose Michigan&rsquo;s hydrosphere. Increasingly recognized in environmental law, policy and regulation (as well as science) for their importance, aquatic systems offer fruitful fields of interesting study and sustainable employment for those who learn how to understand, measure and monitor their dynamic states. Au Sable&rsquo;s <em>Aquatic Biology</em> offers opportunity to pursue that interest and gain that expertise in a landscape endowed with diverse aquatic features. <em>Aquatic Biology</em> provides experience in learning identification and systematics of freshwater fishes and invertebrates within an integrated ecological approach examining patterns of energy flow, nutrient cycling and trophic dynamics in aquatic systems. It also offers an introduction to skills needed in the growing field of environmental inventory and assessment, an area in which aquatic environments receive disproportionate attention.</p>
