%A ZHANG Guang - Ming, XIE Shou - Chang        %T Niche Breadths and Overlaps of Dominant Species of Lithocarpus xylocarpus Community in Ailao Mountains, Yunnan, China %0 Journal Article %D 2000 %J Plant Diversity %R %P 1-3 %V 22 %N 04 %U {https://journal.kib.ac.cn/CN/abstract/article_32485.shtml} %8 2000-08-25 %X Niche breadths and overlaps of 8 dominant species of Lithocarpus xylocarpus community in Ailao mountain area were researched in the present paper, and the results indicated that the community is co -dominated by Lithocarpus xylocarpus, Castanopsis wattii, Schima noronhae, and Lithocarpus chintungensis. Their niche breadth values were 0.8732, 0.7856, 0.6742. and 0.5798. respectively. Species pairs which had more similar biological and ecological properties in the mean time possess bigger niche overlap value rel-atively. For example. " Lithocarpus xyhcarpus + Castanopsis wattii" and " Schima noronhae + Hartia sinensis". Also the importance and position of Schima noronhae in the community should not be overlooked. This proposition was deduced from the fact that it had the higher niche breadth value and showed the higher niche overlap value with most of the other tree species, L. chintungensis was in an opposite situation. It usually acted as the dominant species in some special microhabitat. We used a comparative approach and a numerical analysis to study the various calculating methods of niche breadth and overlap. It should also be noted that stability of the plant community should be an important characteristic that is co - dominated by species with relatively high niche breadth means, and niche overlap exist in most species pairs of one com-munity ought to be a common characteristic of co - dominated communities.