Dynamic Changes of Animal Community Composition and Distribution by Spartina Invasion in Yancheng Beach Wetland, China

Abstract

The total beach animal specimen of the survey was 795.5, which belong to 17 species of 14 families in five classes under four phyla. Batillaria zonalis Bruguiere was the dominant species in the majority study sites during all seasons. Statistical analysis of the sampled data was performed, which covered the community composition, distribution of the number, diversity index, the principal component analysis (PCA), Spielmann rank correlation matrix analysis, Kulczynski comparative analysis of species richness, Mine‐Laying–Curtis clustering of several areas in four seasons. The results showed that the Shannon–Wiener diversity index was higher in January and lower in August. The Simpson diversity indices in the different study sites were quite variable, with the highest being at H1 site in April, and lowest at H3 site in August. The Berger–Parker dominance index for the animal is much different in all the sampling sites, which could be either relatively large, or high to low. The role of PCA had the same or opposite direction of the three components. The Spielmann rank correlation matrix analysis showed a positive and high degree of linear correlation among some groups. The Kulczynski comparative analysis demonstrated that the correlation coefficient between G‐point and H3‐point in January and April was bigger, and it was smaller between H2 site and other sites in October. Species richness displayed a regular distribution. The Mine‐Fields–Curtis clustering analysis showed that the similarity in different seasons was good, with the highest similarity reaching 87.1302 at H3 site between January and October, and the lowest similarity only reaching 3.1693 at the H2 site between August and October.