Local competition two invasive species of Barnacle Amphibalanus improvisus (Darwin,1854) and Bivalves Mytilaster lineatus (Gmelin, 1789) in rocky shores of Caspian basin

Interspecies competition for space and the factors affecting competition are the questionable coastal ecological issues of interactions. Current study aims at studying the competition between two invasive species, Amphibalanus improvisus and Mytilaster lineatus, in rocky shores of Caspian basin. A field study has been conducted distance sampling on 10 stations, once every two month from September 2013 to July 2014, sampled with 15 × 15 cm quadrat, placed at random along natural and artificial rocky shores, from Astara to Babolsar. The algae percent cover has been estimated by 50 × 50 cm quadrate. The mean changes and average variability of water temperature, Salinity, dissolved oxygen and conductivity have been measured as follows: 16.48 0C, 9.87ppt, 9. 89 ppm and16.52m/s. The results for A.improvisus and M.Linatus were as follows, respectively: average number, 404.75 and 327.33; percent cover 36.83 and 29.97; weight 17.8g and 26.47 g. According to tukey test, a meaningful difference is shown to exist among stations and the dominant of M.Lineatus was higher compared to A.imrovisus in stations No.3, 4, 6. Although the results of present study showed that the inter annual mean and standard deviation of algae percent cover was 37.75, the results of tukey test did not show a statistically significant difference between stations. The results of One-way ANOSIM test suggested that the stations No. 3,4,5,6 have the most habitat similarity and environmental factors affecting their distributions, and besides dominance over benthic, the existing competition for space among two species results in favor of bivalve, mostly.