Abstract: To evaluate the relationship between moth community and environmental resources in Manghe National Nature Reserve, Shanxi Province, the niche and composition of moth community from different habitats were analyzed by using Levins niche breadth and Pianka niche overlap indexes. The results indicated that the moth specimens collected in the Reserve belong to 24 families, among which Pyralidae, Noctuidae, Tortricoidae and Geometridae are the dominant groups. The breadth of temporal niche was higher than that of spatial niche for moths and the degree of niche overlap varied with different groups. The temporal niche overlap value (0.913) and spatial niche overlap value (0.852) of Geometridae and Pyralidae were higher than those of the other communities. The temporal niche overlap value (0.772) of Sphingidae and Notodontidae was relatively high, but the spatial niche overlap value (0.218) was low. Except that the coefficient of temporal niche similarity between Sphingidae and Lymantriidae (0.247) and the coefficients of spatial niche similarity between Sphingidae and Saturniidae (0.258) and between Notodontidae and Sphingidae (0.226) were low, the coefficients of niche similarity among other groups of moths were relatively high. These results suggested the intense niche competition among main moth groups in the Reserve.

Key words: neighbor competition, morphological plasticity, fine root, Schima superba, Cunninghamia lanceolata