Status and habitat preferences for endemic inhabitants of fiddler crab Uca formosensis in Hsiang-Shan wetland, Taiwan.
This article reports on soil samples collected from Hsiang-Shan wetland, Taiwan. Canonical discriminant analysis (CDA) was applied to identify an existing habitat type's scheme by identifying the physico-chemical properties of sediment in Hsiang-Shan wetland. The three constructed discriminant functions (CDFs) showed a marked contribution by most of the discriminant variables, and the recognition capacities in these three CDFs were 49.5, 32.8 and 17.7%. Our study revealed that the most important latent factors in Hsiang-Shan wetland are soil texture-caused factor, ocean current-caused factor, nutrient-caused factor, and the redox reaction-caused factor. And the most sensitivity parameters in this habitat followed the descending order: OBD, EC, Eh, sand, TN, porosity, STP, silt, VCP and pH. And the inhabited sediment properties for U. formosensis in terms of soil texture are sand, silt, and clay (34.05, 29.72, and 32.35%, respectively): that is clay loam soil. We also found that U. formosensis preferred to inhabit the upper intertidal zone, spending 8.41% of the time submerged. Vegetation coverage on the ground was less than 2.20%, showing that it preferred to live in a bare intertidal habitat. Concerning nest choosing, excavating burrows is more difficult when a high soil penetration force is required, and in this study the soil penetration force for 20 cm was found to be is 45.98 N/cm(2). The results will be helpful in developing a methodology for use by the government in refining its management programs.
Liao
Shao-Wei
SW
Department of Environmental Resources Management, Tajen University, 20 Wei-Hsin Road, Yen-Pu, Pingtung, Taiwan 10907, Republic of China. swliao@mail.tajen.edu.tw
Chang
Wen-Liang
WL
Lin
Shih-Wei
SW
D000818:Animals; D003386:Brachyura / Q000254:growth & development*; D017753:Ecosystem; D004784:Environmental Monitoring / Q000379:methods; D005843:Geography; D019015:Geologic Sediments / Q000032:analysis; D013624:Taiwan; D053833:Wetlands