Evaluation of macrobenthic fauna in hill stream environment of Western Himalaya, India

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to evaluate seasonal occurrence of macro-benthic fauna in the tributaries of river Beas. The seasonal diversity of macrobenthic fauna was calculated in relation with physico-chemical parameters which revealed that benthic diversity is largely controlled by temperature, water current and volume of water. The width and depth of the streams exhibited an inverse relation with benthic fauna. An inverse relation between temperature and benthos was recorded at the sites located at higher elevation whereas a direct relation was inferred at the lower elevation. The peak of benthic fauna was recorded during winter season at all sampling sites. The benthic fauna was mainly represented by eight groups out of which four are highly distributed at all the sites among which Ephemeroptera were most dominating taxa in the River. Simple correlations were applied for benthos and abiotic factors, which revealed that water temperature, dissolved oxygen, alkalinity, depth and width influenced the invertebrate’s distribution and abundance.