Functional Diversity of the Fish Community Associated to Soft-Bottoms in the Lagoon of La Paz B.C.S., México

Abstract

There has been an increase of community studies that incorporate the use of functional diversity indices. The incorporation of these indices in the analy-sis of marine communities is recent, however, could contribute with relevant information about the health of those communities. The lagoon of La Paz is a body of water located in La Paz, B.C.S., México. Despite its regional im-portance, there are not recent studies about its fish communities. Therefore, the aim of the present study was to analyze the temporal and spatial structure of the functional diversity of fish communities associated to soft bottoms, from August 2016 to July 2017, as well as important environmental varia-bles. Functional diversity indices showed significant differences between months. Spatial analysis did not show significant differences perhaps due to low variability of the type of substrate. Temperature showed temporal dif-ferences as well. Therefore, temperature may be a limiting environmental variable for many fish species inhabiting coastal lagoons.