with Cs the similarity coefficient, i the ith quadrat,n the number of quadrats, and Pc the mass fraction of common species coexisting among the quadrats. Cs takes values of [0,1], where values closer to 1 indicate greater similar.
Before statistical analyses, data were logarithmic transformed to control the normality when necessary. Differences among groups were evaluated by one-way ANOVA followed by least significant difference (LSD) tests and Pearson correlation coefficients using SPSS 16.0 (SPSS Inc., Chicago, IL, USA). All differences were considered significant atP <0.05.