Abstract: Taking seven pine plantations in Jiangsu, Anhui, and Guangdong provinces of China as test sites, an investigation was made on the population composition and niche of arthropod community in the pine shoot tunnel bored by Dioryctria rubella. The populations of the arthropod community were identified as 2 classes, 9 orders and 13 families, i.e., Arachnida including Araneae and Acarina, and Insecta including Collembola, Dermaptera, Psocoptera, Hemiptera, Thysanoptera, Coleoptera and Hymenoptera. Among the 13 families, Acarina and Staphylinidae were the dominant populations, Poduridae was the abundant population, Psocidae, Labiduridae, Formicidae, Silvanidae, Curculionidae, Thripidae and Braconidae were the frequent populations, while Scolytidae, Pentatomidae and Erigonidae were the rare populations. The spatiotemporal niche overlap calculated by Levins and Pianka formula was the largest between D. rubella  and Staphylinidae, indicating their closest relationship. The spatial pattern of dominant population Staphylinidae calculated with aggregation index and zero frequency methods was of aggregative, and the population type was of inverse zero frequent-dependent in terms of aggregation degree.

Key words: Transgenic hybrid poplar 741, Gypsy moth, Insect-resistance