Changing zooplankton assemblage and increasing jellyfish abundance in the coastal waters of Bushehr–Delvar

Abstract

The present investigation was performed to identify the impact effect of development and climate change on the zooplankton assemblage in coastal waters of Bushehr-Delvar region. Sampling was occurred seasonally at depths of less than 10 m using a Bongonet (100 µm) at 10 stations including Jophreh, Jalali, Dastak, Saretol, Helileh, Bandargah, Niroogah, Bushehr, Piazy and Delvar from the summer 2015 to the spring 2016. 40 Zooplanktoon groups belong to 8 Phyla were identified. Crustaceans were the most dominant zooplankton group with the average annual abundance of 37.66% of total zooplankton abundance. The total annual abundance of jellyfish including Salps, Cnidaria and Ctenophora was 16.11% which in comparison with the previous registered data indicated a significant increase over the last four decades in the region. The average annual abundance of zooplankton and Shannon-wiener diversity index were 10577.5±5512.69 /m 3

Keywords

• zooplankton; Density; species diversity; Jellyfish; bushehr; Persian Gulf