Abstrak Fish Community Structure in Relation to Water Quality of the Down Stream of Musi River, South Sumatera, Indonesia

Chapter 2008 with 341 download times

Authors

,Husnah,Eko Prianto,Makri,

Musi River is a large river with its drainage area covers three provinces,  South Sumatera,  Lampung, and Bengkulu,  and with  multi  uses of its  resources. At the  down stream  of Musi River,  most activities are dominated by industries with their waste  products go into the river which  could  harm its aquatic organism. Several assessment studies  have  been conducted  in the Musi River,  however they focused on physical  and chemical  aspects  of the water. Aquatic  organisms can reveal the real world effects of exceedences and consequent harm  more precisely than can be predicted  or measured on a chemical and or toxicity basis alone. Compared to other aquatic biota, fish are of particular interest for biological indicators.  Species  diversity  and dominance  are component of community structure that can be used to study several changes  caused  by the aquatic environment degradation The community structure of fish is frequently monitored to describe  river conditions.  Study in order to determine  the fish community structure  in  relation  to water  quality  of down stream  of  Musi River was conducted  on April  and June 2007.  Sampling  on physical  and  chemical  parameters  of  the water  and  sediment,  and fish  sample were  carried in each  sampling site.  Water  sample was collected  at a depth of 1.0 m from  the water surface  by using  kemmerer water sampler.  Some water quality  parameters such  as temperature, pH, and dissolved  oxygen were directly analyzed  in the field, while other water quality parameters such as total suspended  solids,  total  dissolved  solids,  biochemical  oxygen  demand,  nitrate,  and  phosphate were  analyzed  in  laboratory.  Fish  sample  was  collected  from  the  experiment fishing  and  from  the fishermen.  Two type  of fishing  gears,  electrofishing, and  gill  net with  8 different  mesh  sizes  were used.  Fish  sample  from fishing  experiment and from the fishermen  were  collected,  sorted  based on the species,  labelled,  measured  for their weight  and individual  number,  and then  preserved  with  10% off formaldehyde water quality  parameters  were  analyzed  using  principle  component analysis  while fish relative abundances were analyzed with cluster.  Fish community  structure through simple diversity and dominance  index,  and proportionate  abundance  of species  (relative  abundance)  were correlated with the quality of aquatic  environment.  The down stream  of Musi River station  starting  from  Gandus to PT.  SAP station was in  degradation  presses  state indicated  by diversity  index  in the range of 1   to 2 and high  proportion  of small fish  than that the large  fish.

KEYWORDS:   fish community structure, diversity, dominance, water quality, Musi River