BOB 2008 - Ben Gutierrez
Research Projects
Project 1 - Lambir
coworkers: Wan and Greg
In this project, we studied the level of mosquito bites in the hours surrounding dawn and dusk.
We also identified the mosquito specimens to genus level (there are only 5 mosquito genera in
all of Borneo) in order to see if the composition of mosquitos changed throughout the day. Our
results showed that peak hours for mosquitos are actually not close to dawn and dusk, but at
sometime in mid-afternoon. The two most common mosquito generas - Anopheles and Aedes - showed
statisticially different bite number curves during the evening, suggesting that maybe Aedes prefers
more light or higher temperature.
Mosquito Project
Project 2 - Gaya Island
coworker: Shreekant
For this project, Shreekant and I tested whether the structural complexity of corals affected
the diversity of fish that used them. We focused our study on three forms of coral, from least
physically complex to most physically complex: massive corals, digitate corals, and branching corals.
We found from our study that there is no statistically significant difference in fish diversity
between massive corals and digitate corals, but there is a statistically significant difference
between these two coral types and branching corals. In other words, branching corals were definitely
more diverse in the fish that they harbored.
Coral Project
Project 3 - Maliau Basin
coworkers: Dwi and Eni
For my final project, Dwi, Eni and I compared the abundance and diversity of Rattan in logged
and unlogged forests. Rattan is a spiky palmate plant that is important for the construction
of wickerware furniture. None of our comparisons turned out to be statistically significant, but
we did notice a possible link between the level of flooding that a trail undergoes and the presence
of Rattan there. The logging skid trails underwent a lot of flooding when it rained and remained
waterlogged for days later, and this may have been the reason why there were six or seven times
that we did not find any Rattan in the plots we chose in the logged forest. In the unlogged forest,
on the other hand, we found Rattan wherever we placed our plot, except for one part of the trail
that was right next to the river.
Rattan Project