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ASSESSMENT OF
PLANKTONIC DIVERSITY IN RIVER CHENAB AS AFFECTED BY SEWAGE OF
MULTAN CITY
MUHAMMAD ISMAIL
CHUGHTAI1,2, KHALID MAHMOOD1 AND ABDUL RASUL AWAN1
Abstract:
A study was carried out
to investigate the monthly variations in planktonic life of river Chenab
as affected by sewage of Multan City by analyzing frequency of
occurrence, relative abundance and diversity index of plankton life.
Density and diversity of plankton was used as a measure of water
quality. Phytoplankton were abundant as compared to Zooplankton. Of the
86 Phytoplankton genera recorded, 13 were of Cyanophyta, 34 of
Chlorophyta, 28 of Chrysophyta, 3 of Cryptophyta, 5 of Euglenophyta and
3 genera of Pyrrhophyta. Eighteen genera of Zooplankton were observed
including 12 of Protozoan, 5 of Rotifers and one genus of Cladoceran.
Total number of organisms was 1835, out of which 1733 were Phytoplankton
and 102 were Zooplankton. Diversity index of Phytoplankton ranged from
3.34 to 6.79 and diversity index of Zooplankton ranged from 0.51 to
2.58. It may be concluded that the quality of Chenab water is marginally
fit as the diversity index of Zooplankton was less than three throughout
the study period.
1Nuclear Institute for Agriculture and Biology, P.O. Box 128, Faisalabad,
Pakistan
2Institute of Pure and Applied Biology, Bahauddin Zakariya University,
Multan, Pakistan
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