A CHECKLIST OF FRESHWATER PRAWN SPECIES OF THE PALAEMONIDAE FAMILY IN THE NORTHWEST PART OF BANGLADESH
Date
2019-12
Authors
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Journal ISSN
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Publisher
HAJEE MOHAMMOD DANESH SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY UNIVERSITY, DINAJPUR
Abstract
To formulate information on the freshwater prawn species and to identify any species at a
glance clearly and simply a checklist of freshwater prawn species (Palaemonidae)
collected from Northwest part of Bangladesh was prepared. A total of Sixty four samples
of freshwater prawn were collected from the waterbody of Dinajpur, Rangpur and
Thakurgoan districts of Bangladesh. Samples were observed through six morphological
characters namely body color, the number of chela, rostrum shape, rostrum teeth, abdomen
shape, segments size of walking leg and eight morphometric characters i.e. Total length
(TL), Rostrum length (RL), Cephalothorax length (CL), Cephalothorax height (CH),
Second pleon segment height (SSH), Sixth pleon segment length (SISL), TeL (Telson
length), TeW (Telson width). After observing the morphological and morphometric
characters a total of seven species were found to be different and identified by checking
with previous literature. The identified species were Macrobrachium lanchesteri, M.
palaemonides, M. lamarrei, M. idella, M. dolicodectylus and M. latidactylus. One way
varience of analysis (ANOVA) at 5% level of significance showed significant difference
among all the morphometric ratios (TL/RL, TL/CL, TL/TeL, CL/CH, TeL/TeW,
SSH/SISL and RL/CL) except CL/CH that was found to be insignificant, p>0.05. The
Pearson Correlation was also showed the ratios are found to be significant. The
discriminate function analysis (DFA) revealed that seven morphometric ratios contributed
six discriminate functions (DFs) that are accounted for six species by reducing a single
species. DF1 accounted for 69.4%of the total variation while DF2, DF3, DF, DF5 and
DF6 accounted for 15.5, 9.2, 4.8, 1.0 and 0.1% of the total variation respectively. This
study synthesized a concise idea about the available freshwater prawn in Bangladesh.
Several consecutive studies including DNA barcoding are needed to formulation exact
information on the detail record of freshwater Palaemonid prawn in the waterbodies of
Bangladesh.
Description
Bangladesh is one of the world’s leading fish producing country with a total production of
4.381 million MT in fiscal year 2018-19 (The Bangladesh Economic Census 2019). It is
the third largest aquatic biodiversity in Asia after China and India and considered the most
suitable regions for fisheries in the world with the world largest flooded wetland.
Fisheries is a science or study of fish and fish related organisms that deals with the fishes,
crustaceans, mollusks and all other aquatic animals which are harvested. According to
‘The Bangladesh Economic Census 2019’, fisheries sector contributes 3.61% of the total
Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of Bangladesh which is 25.03% of the total Agricultural
GDP, while by exporting 0.46 lac metric ton fish and fishery products we have earned
2757.8 crore taka of which majority products are shellfishes mostly shrimp, prawns; the
most important shellfish recourse of Bangladesh.
Keywords
Checklist, Prawn, Macrobrachium, Biodiversity