[Relationships between island characteristics and arthropod diversity in Thousand-Island Lake]

In April, May, August, and October 2006, grid-based sampling method was adopted to investigate the diversity and abundance of arthropods on 50 islands in the Thousand-island Lake, with the effects of island area, island altitude, island shape, inter-island distance, and island-mainland distance on arthropod species richness analyzed. With the increase of island area, the richness of total arthropod species and that of the arthropod species with high- and low- dispersal ability all increased, and the relationships between island area and arthropod species richness corresponded to the classical island biogeography model. The island area, island altitude, and island shape had comprehensive effects on the arthropod species richness, while inter-island distance and island-mainland distance had less effects. The richness of total arthropod species had a significant positive correlation with island altitude and island shape, that of the arthropod species with high- dispersal ability was significantly positively correlated with island area and island altitude, while no significant relationship was observed between the richness of arthropod species with low-dispersal ability and the island characteristics.