Seasonal Study of Zooplanktonic Diversity of River Narmada, Jabalpur Region (M.P) India

The current studies intends to provide an overview of zooplanktonic species richness of Narmada river. The studies are carried out in 5 prefix sampling stations of river Narmada from October 2011 to September 2012 in Jabalpur region which is one of the most famous city of Madhya-Pradesh, also called as Mahakoushal. The water samples were collected every month for the qualitative and quantitative analysis of zooplanktons. Seasons are categorized as Oct-Jan as winters, Feb. -May as summers and June-Sept as Rainy season. Zooplanktons are cellular metazoans in the water bodies ranging in size from about 0.05mm to 0.1mm. They provide food for many fishes and therefore, play a vital role in the food chain of ponds, tanks and rivers. In Zooplanktons, 13 species were recorded belonging to 5 different groups (Protozoa, Copepoda, Ostracoda, Cladocera and Rotifera). Copepoda was observed to be the most dominating group with 4 species and Cyclops as the most dominating species. Whereas, protozoa was observed to be the least dominating group with 3 species and Vorticella as the most dominating species. Zooplanktonic abundance was recorded to be in peak during Summer season whereas declined in monsoon and remained intermediate in winters. In the seasonal studies of zooplanktonic species, the order of dominance (as per total density) was observed to be as, Copepodagreater thanCladoceragreater thanRotiferagreater thanOstracodagreater thanProtozoa.