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Implications of Physical Barriers on Longitudinal Connectivity in the Ganga River System through Morphological Assessment of Cirrhinus mrigala (Cyprinidae) Populations

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Abstract

Studies on phenotypic variations among isolated populations help towards understanding the divergent natural selection acting on species. This study examines phenotypic variations among wild populations of an important Indian major carp, Cirrhinus mrigala (Hamilton, 1822) collected from ten locations throughout its distribution range in the Ganga River, India covering up- and downstream of all the four barrages (Bijnor, Narora, Kanpur and Farakka) to assess the implications of physical barriers on longitudinal connectivity of the Ganga River. Landmark based truss morphometric analysis and multivariate analyses were used to quantify the extent of morphological differences among populations. Post-hoc paired comparisons, discriminant function analysis and Mahalanobis distances revealed morphological differences between up and downstream individuals at all the four barrages. Phenotypic plasticity owing to habitat dissimilarities or due to environment and genotype interactions may play a vital role for these phenotypic differences between fish populations. This study is only a first step to recognize different stocks, and to identify fish movement between sites and therefore can be useful for developing suitable plan for conservation and restoration of fish populations in river ecosystem fragmented by physical barriers.

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This work was supported by fishermen group (Mr. Kamal and Mr. Jatin) who cooperated in fish sample collection. This research did not receive any specific funding.

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    A. K. Dwivedi

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Dwivedi, A.K. Implications of Physical Barriers on Longitudinal Connectivity in the Ganga River System through Morphological Assessment of Cirrhinus mrigala (Cyprinidae) Populations. J. Ichthyol. 61, 270–279 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1134/S0032945221020053

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