Nutrient Transfer in Mangrove Habitat with Reference to Avicennia marina (Forsk.) Vierh.

摘要

The mangrove ecosystem is a fragile complex and dynamic ecosystem, which is dependent on a number of environmental factors. Mangroves like any other plant need their macro and micronutrients, which they obtain from the medium in which they grow. Veryoften the nutrients in the growth medium many become inaccessible to the plants due to unfavorable factors like pollution, acidity, alkalinity etc.The present investigation was undertaken to study the effect of pollution on the nutrient transfer in Avicennia marina, an intertidal, salt excreting sps. of the mangroves. Soil and Plants from the two sampling sites viz Eastern Express Highway (betweenBhandup - Vikhroli) and Palghar were collected in the month of September 2005 and analyzed for various nutrients viz. Nitrogen, Phosphorus, Calcium, Magnesium, Sodium, Potassium and Sulphur.In general, the concentration of all the nutrients except sulphur was maximum in the soil followed by leaves and minimum was in stems; however sulphur showed a reverse trend, being more in the plant body than in the soil.The results also show the Palghar site, which happens to be comparatively free from vehicular pollution, to be more nutrient rich than eastern express highway site.