Studies on macrobenthic organisms in relation to water parameters at East Calcutta Wetlands

East Calcutta Wetlands is an internationally important site for natural remediation of domestic sewage and organic waste and their successful recycling into habitat for pisciculture. Macrobenthic fauna is responsible for efficient utilization of sediments and their diversity indicates health of a wetland in accordance to its sediment quality. In the present study, several physico-chemical parameters such as DO (3.03-11.06 ppm), CO2 (4.02-20.0 ppm), alkalinity (36.83-164.0 ppm), total hardness (100.0-270.00 ppm), TDS (450.0-620 ppm), chloride(142.0-364.2 ppm), pH (7.3-8.5), water transparency (8.0-54.2 cm), organic contents like organic carbon (1.03-10.9 mg g(-1)) were studied. Variation in macrobenthic fauna from the selected fields were also examined by calculating Simpson's dominance index, evenness index (Pielou index), Shannon's diversity index. 12 taxa of mollusk and 1 taxa of annelid were found in the study and Bellamyo and Thiara were the most dominant species which indicated clean water of the pond. The correlation between macrobenthic diversity and physico-chemical parameters were also studied in selected ponds from East Calcutta Wetlands.