PORING HOTSPRINGS RANGER STATION

The first phase of field studies was from March to August 1989, at Poring Hotsprings Ranger Station (Poring), in Kinabalu Park, Sabah, Malaysia (06°03$$N; 116°42$$E; fig. 3.1), under the hospitality of the Sabah Parks Department. Two of the park staff, Alim Biun and Hajinin Hussain, collaborated full time in the research during this field season, to the great benefit of the study. Alim and Hajinin cheerfully endured barbaric work schedules (sometimes radio-tracking from 4:30 in the morning to 8:30 at night) and taught me much about the animals and forest. At Poring we worked on two study plots, a “low” plot on a ridge crest at the base of the Eastern Ridge of the Mount Kinabalu massif and a “high” plot on a ridge 2.5 km northwest from Poring, above the trail to Langanan Falls.

The low plot occupies a small side ridge separated by a steep ravine and stream from the main Eastern Ridge. We chose this site because it included the largest relatively flat area of lowland forest in that section of the park. All vegetation below it was secondary or agricultural. The plot began at about 535 m elevation at the lower limit of the mature forest and extended 500 m in a wedge to where the ridge narrowed to about 50 m at 720 m elevation. We worked along a trail above this 300 m farther, to 800 m elevation. On this area we opened and used a small trail system for radio-tracking, which was flanked by steep ravines on each side, and we trapped treeshrews in a grid on the wider, lower part (fig. 3.3). The flattish triangle within our trails measured 6 ha and was 200 m wide at the base and 460 m long. We followed treeshrews in this plot throughout our study at Poring.

This lowland plot had vegetation characterized by a high canopy of emergents, dominated by tall dipterocarps on the higher well-drained ridge tops and edges, with generally smaller trees such as oaks (Lithocarpus spp., Castanopsis spp.) occupying the lower portions. The understory ranged from bare and open to vine-choked ravines and thickets of saplings in old lightgaps (openings caused by treefalls). Most of the study plot had a fairly open understory. A high diversity of dense rattan palms scrambled throughout much of the forest, and groves of understory Licuala sp. and other palms grew at 700 m on slopes (fig. 3.4). Where light entered on ravine sides or rocky slopes, curtains of vines draped the steep rock faces. Except in dank ravine bottoms, there were scarcely any trunk or branch epiphytes on the trees at this elevation, apart from isolated baskets of giant staghorn ferns (Platycerium sp.). The forest floor had a good cover of leaf litter, except where this was swept away

---

by water runoff. The soil here at the mountain base was of brown to red clay, slippery as grease when soaked, interspersed with granite rocks. The only surface water was in streams at the bottom of ravines at either side and in a few wallows made and maintained by bearded pigs (Sus barbatus). When they held water, these wallows were water holes used by mammals, birds, and amphibians.

The Langanan (high) plot was likewise chosen for its flattish profile and workable vegetation, after initial trapping showed it to include many montane treeshrews. It also was on a ridge top, in the shape of a rough equilateral triangle encompassing 3.8 ha. It ranged in elevation from 930 to 1,000 m. We filled the area with lines of traps spaced at 25 m intervals. We worked in this plot only to study mountain treeshrews (T. montana), from 29 June to 31 July 1989. To reach the high plot to start work before dawn, we had to leave our house at 0430 h and walk for an hour.

The forest on the high plot is a closed canopy of small- to mediumdiameter trees, generally small-leafed, growing on a rocky substrate (fig. 3.5). The understory is dense and characterized by numerous, prehensile rattans that grab one's skin and clothing and enforce cautious movement. At this elevation condensation from the afternoon mists, which daily shroud Mount Kinabalu during many months of the year, is evident in an abruptly increased density of trunk and branch epiphytes such as moss, ferns, and orchids; moss on the rocks and tree trunks; and the formation of a spongy mat of tree roots and moss lying above the soil surface. At the level of the plot this springy surface root mat was just beginning to develop and quite thin. At higher elevations it can become several feet thick, with the moss-covered root mat entirely above ground

---

and extremely difficult to traverse (one repeatedly drops hip-deep into unseen holes full of black muck), a reason we chose to work at the low edge of this altitudinal transition.

The lands skirting Mount Kinabalu are quite densely occupied by Dusun people, for whom hunting is an important tradition. Poaching in the park was intense and difficult to control, and large game mammals were much reduced or in some cases extirpated in the vicinity of Poring, so that the fauna there appeared to be diminished at the time of our study. Much of the forest outside of the park has been cut, leaving few natural areas for legal hunting, and there were no significant tracts of lowland forest workable from Poring.