Clustering of the abundance of West Nile virus vector mosquitoes in Peel Region, Ontario, Canada

Understanding the spatial–temporal distribution of vector mosquitoes is essential in designing an efficient mosquito control strategy to reduce the risk of the mosquito-borne disease. In this paper, we apply a non-parametric clustering method, CLUES, to the surveillance data of West Nile virus vector mosquitoes collected by light traps in Peel Region, Ontario, during the mosquito seasons in 2004–2010. In order to obtain robust and reliable results, a statistical smoothing procedure LOWESS is applied to the original time series data. It was found that the mosquito trap sites can be clustered into three groups. The weather impact on the mosquito abundance of each clustered group are similar, while the interannual variability and the highest abundance and peak time in each mosquito season are different. The impact of weather factors on this clustering is investigated.