Basic characteristics of rodent comm unities in lakefront rice area of Dongting Lake

Rodent communities have been studied in Matangyuan，Yueyang Co unty，Dongting lakefront rice area．The ro-dent communities can be divided into four types，i．e．Apodemus agrarius+Microtus fortis community in farmland(A)，Microtus fortis+Apodemus agrarius+Rattus rosea community in hills(B)，Microtus fortis community in lake beach (C)，Mus musculus+Rattus flavipectus+Rattus norvegicus community in indoor(D)．The structure of communitv A is similar to that of community B，and they are significantly different between years，but other community structures are significant difference．The diversity index of community B is the highest one(1.619)．The diversity and evenness indexes of community C are the lowest(0.052 and 0.033)，but its dominance index is the highest(0.990)．Evenness index of community D is the highest(0.721)，but its dominance index is the lowest(0.407)．