Plant Diversity Performance After Natural Restoration in Reclaimed Deyeuxia angustifolia Wetland

Deyeuxia angustifolia wetlands were widely distributed in the Sanjiang Plain in Northeast China. Due to strong demand for food production, large-area wetlands were reclaimed to farmlands, which threatened regional ecological security greatly. Since the 21 th century, returning farmlands to wetlands was widely adopted for natural restoration in the Sangjiang Plain. As the first reflection of wetland restoration, vegetation succession of restored D. angustifolia wetlands should be fully assessed. In this study, vegetation investigation was carried out in three restored D. angustifolia wetlands with 5, 8 and 12 yr restoration, respectively. Meanwhile, a natural D. angustifolia wetland was selected as reference wetland. Results showed that community composition changed greatly and there was visible community succession. Community dominant species changed from composite to gramineae as restoration time increasing.At first, weeds community appeared in the restored wetlands, especially the xerophytes developed to the pioneer species rapidly. And then, mesophytes and wetland species became the dominant species in the restored wetlands. Finally, wetland species, especially D. angustifolia, occupied the dominant position of restored community. Shannon-wiener index(H) and Simpson index(D) both decreased to close to natural D. angustifolia wetlands. Compared with natural D. angustifolia wetland, species composition and diversity in restored wetlands were more complex and higher. As restoration time increasing, there were not significant differences between community characteristics of restored wetlands and natural wetland. All these suggested that vegetation in reclaimed D. angustifolia wetland could be restored naturally, but its restored period is 10 yr at least. From another angle, it is important to protect current natural wetlands.