Abstract
To clarify the early succession of flora and fauna in a newly developed biotope, we constructed a 250 -m2 waterside biotope and monitored annual changes in vegetation and monthly changes in dragonflies and birds from 2005 to 2012. The results showed that the initial colonizing weeds were replaced with species more typical of hydrarch environments. In the shrub layer, no correlation was observed between the number of colonized species over time; however, a liner increase was observed in the cumulative and extant numbers of species over time. In the herbaceous layer, the number of colonized species decreased, while the cumulative number of species increased logarithmically. The number of extant species was not correlated with time. The number of bird species changed in a manner similar to the herbaceous plants, with 33 species observed in the breeding season and 35 in wintering season. Conversely, all 16 dragonfly species had colonized the area within two years of site development, and did not varied up to 2012. The period required for similarity of species composition to decrease by half was estimated to be 5 to 7 years for terrestrial vegetation, 10 to 20 for aquatic vegetation, 40 for dragonflies, and 30 to 60 for birds.
