Phytoplankton distribution in the coastal waters off Porbandar (Saurashtra)

Abstract

Skeletonema costatum was the most abundant species in all the 3 stations. The distribution of Asterionella japonica was least consistent than that of Nitzschia closterium which was most consistent at Station 1. At station 2,29.3% of the species were found to coexist. Temperature, salinity and oxygen were insignificant in predicting the abundance of the species in the three stations. The species abundance differ significantly station-wise and species-wise but not season-wise. Mac Arthur's measure of equitability which was used to find species diversity, indicated that sample community has a species diversity "appropriate" to a community of only 40%, 20%, 27% of the species actually observed in the 1st, 2nd and 3rd station respectively