Andrew
From BiodivBorneo09
I am a Junior at Harvard, and I am concentrating in Organismic and Evolutionary Biology. I grew up in upstate New York, and have always enjoyed being outdoors and exploring. It’s a thrill to be able to participate in this trip, and I won’t hesitate to say that it’s been one of the best decisions I’ve ever made to come along! It is difficult for me to pick a particularly favorite taxon, though I’ve always had a soft spot for insects (and fish, and irises, and felines, and molluscs, and reptiles, and cnidarians – the list goes on…). If you have a look at the observations that I have put up (look for the moths), it should be easy to figure out what I enjoy working with most, or at least what I’m most likely to photograph. It’s been an endeavor of mine to try and find a particular area of focus within biology that I like most while studying here, and it looks like I might be leaning toward entomology after all; we’ll see what the next few years bring!
Any time that I spend outside of the academic realm is usually dedicated to singing, either with the Harvard Glee Club during the academic year, or alone. I used to spend a lot of time drawing and sketching (see below) and my favorite medium is the Linoleum Block Print. I’ve taken the chance to be a little creative during this trip with photographs (when I’m not getting up close and personal with bugs!) and hopefully, when I get back home, I’ll be able to design a few postcards on linoleum blocks based on some of the things that we’ve seen here.
Projects
As for what I’ve studied while here in Borneo, I’ve taken the opportunity to look at:
- The bark characteristics of trees in Lambir Hills, and the pattern of liana (woody climber) growth on trees with certain types of tree bark.
- Sea cucumber habitat choices: do they prefer open or covered locations on the coral reef?
- Dragonfly behavior at Maliau Basin – are species interactions random, or is there a dominance hierarchy?
- And finally, my focal taxon of choice, the butterfly group, Nymphalidae!
