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Characterization of fish community structure and an estuarine fish community index for temporarily closed estuaries (TCEs) from India’s south-western coast

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Abstract

We present for the first time, data on fish assemblage structure for ten temporarily closed estuaries (TCEs) along the south-western coast of India. Fish community structure differed significantly between TCEs based on species presence/absence, estuarine use and feeding mode. Marine migrant and freshwater stragglers dominated the ‘fish guilds’, while piscivores and zoobenthivores were the major feeding guilds, in all estuaries. We used the Estuarine Fish Community Index (EFCI) and a Combined Anthropogenic Pressure Index (CPI) to determine the ecological quality of TCEs. The application of functional guilds and EFCI successfully represented the use of TCEs by fish communities, and also the functional similarities existing between fish assemblages of these estuaries, despite considerable taxonomic, physical and chemical differences. EFCI indicated that the ecological health of TCEs in south-western India ranges from ‘poor’ to ‘good’. We also established a significant relationship between CPI, EFCI and ecological quality in various TCEs using the Generalized Linear Model (GLM).

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Acknowledgements

We are grateful to the authorities of the Kerala University of Fisheries and Ocean Studies (KUFOS) Kochi, India, and ICAR-Central Coastal Agricultural Research Institute (CCARI), Goa, India for providing the necessary help and support, and to Trevor Harrison for his constructive criticisms and suggestions which helped improve the quality of the manuscript. We are grateful to M.K. Sajeevan (Head of the Department, Fisheries Resource Management, KUFOS), Vishwajeet Prajapati (Technical officer, ICAR-CCARI-Goa) and Albin Albert (ICAR-CIFRI) for their technical help during the preparation of the manuscript.

Funding

This work is a part of PhD research supported by the Faculty of Fisheries of the Kerala University of Fisheries and Ocean Studies (KUFOS), Kochi, India and the Department of Fisheries, Government of Kerala, India.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Fisheries Resource Management, Kerala University of Fisheries and Ocean Studies (KUFOS), Kochi, India

    Bella Kiranya, Pramila Sahadevan & Rajeev Raghavan

  2. ICAR-Central Coastal Agricultural Research Institute (CCARI), Old Goa, Goa, India

    Sreekanth Giri Bhavan

  3. Department of Aquatic Biology and Fisheries, University of Kerala, Thiruvananthapuram, India

    Appukuttannair Biju Kumar

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  1. Bella Kiranya
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  4. Appukuttannair Biju Kumar
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  5. Rajeev Raghavan
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Contributions

KB: collection of data, analysis and preparation of manuscript;

PS: overall supervision, guidance and manuscript editing;

SGB: data analysis and interpretation;

RR: reviewing and editing;

BK: technical guidance, reviewing and editing.

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Correspondence to Bella Kiranya.

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Kiranya, B., Sahadevan, P., Bhavan, S.G. et al. Characterization of fish community structure and an estuarine fish community index for temporarily closed estuaries (TCEs) from India’s south-western coast. Environ Sci Pollut Res 29, 37969–37988 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-022-18631-2

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