한국 천수만 퇴적물에 서식하는 중형저서생물의 군집구조 및 섭식량

Abstract

Tidal flat constitutes a fairly common coastal environment around the world and are amongst the most productive and important ecosystems in Korea. The west and south coasts of the Korean peninsular and the China coast if Korea Bay have about 6,000 ㎢ of intertidal area which, when treated as one complex, rates as the largest intertidal area in the world. The meiofauna community structure by environmental change in the tidal flats was studied at several tidal flats of the west coast of Korea 1997 to 2002. The Community structure of meiobenthos was studied seasonally at 5 stations of Bangameori tidal flat and 3 stations of subtidal area in Daebudo near the Shiwha dike in the west coast of Korea, from May 2000 to February 2001. Mean grain size of intertidal stations ranged from 3.16 φ to 3.73 φ (sand), subtidal stations were 5.81～6.67 φ (mud). Nematodes were the most dominant group among the representative 19 meiofaunal groups at all stations in both tidal flat and sub-tidal area. The sub-dominant groups were benthic harpacticoid copepods and Sarcomastigophorans. The density of meiobenthos ranged from 145 inds./10㎠ to 2,057 inds./10㎠ (0-1cm) in the sediment of intertidal stations, and from 391 to 3,787 inds./10㎠ (0-5cm) in the subtidal stations. The lowest meiofaunal density was recorded in winter, whereas the highest density was shown in spring. Comparing with another previous work at the same area, data from this study does not statistically shown differences with results before discharge of shiwha lake water. Meiofaunal community change was studied at field experimental habitats chosen for understanding community processes in restoration habitats in Hogok Ri from 1999 to 2001. Four separated habitats of different environmental conditions for the field experiment were designed as 1) a natural sediment habitat without any reed forest, 2) a natural habitat including reed forests, 3) a habitat of newly deposited sediment in a sediment traps, and 4) an artificial