The Polychaeta (Annelida) communities of the Merambong and Tanjung Adang Shoals, Malaysia, and its relationship with the environmental variables

摘要: Polychaetes are very important group of macrobenthos thatplay major roles in the maintenance, well being and dynamics themarine benthic ecosystem. In seagrass bed areas they normally form themost diverse abundant invertebrate taxa, thus understanding theirpopulation is for ecosystem management. The aimof this study was to investigate polychaete community structure inthe Merambong Tanjung Adang shoals, Johor,Malaysia, determine environmental variables that might affecttheir distribution abundance. polychaetes were sampled usinga 10 cm diameter corer, which conducted during lowest tide.A total 22 different families recorded, wasdominated by Capitellidae, Spionidae, Cirratulidae, Nereididae.The diversity Shoal (H’=2.27) wassignificantly higher than (H’=1.76) (P<0.05),and cluster (Bray-Curtis similarities) as nMDS analyses showedclear separation between two sites. Multivariate analysis (BIO-ENV,PRIMER software) found pH, Cr, organic matter percentageof clay-sand influencing polychaetecommunity. It concluded differences environmentalparameters have some influence on communitystructure assemblages at area.