Abstract
The rice–fish co-culture is an important model of carp farming in China; however, research on the dynamics and assembly of water bacterial communities in this system remains limited. Therefore, this study aimed to explore the dynamics and assembly of bacterial communities, as well as their correlation with environmental factors in paddy water. For these purposes, this study was divided into two groups: a rice–carp co-culture (WRC) group and a rice monoculture (WRM) group, with 20 rice fields in each group. After 60 days of farming, the concentrations of NH4+-N, NO2−-N, TN, and PO43− were significantly higher in the WRC group than those in the WRM group. Alpha diversity analysis showed that the Shannon index in the WRC group was significantly decreased compared with the WRM group. At the phylum level, the relative abundance of Actinobacteria significantly increased, while the relative abundance of Proteobacteria and Bacteroidetes significantly decreased in the paddy water of the WRC group. The neutral community model (NCM) indicated that a random process played a dominant role in the construction of bacterial communities in the two groups, and common carp cultivation increased migration rates, thereby affecting community assembly. The co-occurrence network displayed that common carp cultivation led to looser interactions between bacterial communities. In addition, the contents of nutrients significantly affected the abundance of bacteria in paddy water. In summary, carp cultivation decreased the diversity of bacteria and changed the relative abundance of dominant bacteria, thereby affecting the stability and assembly of bacterial communities.