Phytoplankton diversity in the coastal waters of Port Blair, South Andaman, India

摘要

The present study deals with the diversity of phytoplankton from two selected stations, (Station 1: Junglighat and Station 2: Science Centre) during December 2010 to February 2011 in the coastal waters of Port Blair, South Andaman. Special emphasis was given to visualise the phytoplankton assemblages of the selected stations during low tide and high tide. Qualitative analysis reveals occurrence of 114 species belonging to 42 genera of diatoms, 16 genera of dinoflagellates and 4 genera of Cyanobacteria. Quantitatively, diatoms are dominant (56.8-95.6%) followed by dinoflagellates (1.5-32.2%) and Cyanobacteria (1.2-14.6%) respectively. It has been interpreted that the variation in tides and other environmental factors have influence on the species diversity and representation of specific micro-algal groups at different times. However, the study indicates rather low phytoplankton productivity in the study area.