Biodiversity of Bhatye estuary, Ratnagiri, Maharashtra, India

Ratnagiri is an important city along the West Coast of India and has number of fish landing centers. There are couple of fish canning industries which export various fish products to foreign countries and in turn earn foreign exchange. The fishing potential of this region largely is supported by the Bhatye Estuary which harbors a rich biodiversity of flora and fauna, of which mangroves are of more relevance to us. During our studies we could report ten species of mangroves, 36 species of mangrove associates, 45 species of phytoplankton, 40 species of zooplankton, 34 species of macrobenthic fauna, 22 species of finfishes, insects belonging to six different orders and 45 species of avifauna. Apart from this we also have studied the distribution of mangrove vegetation along the estuary and reported some species to be of dominant nature like Avicennia, Rhizophora and Sonneratia species.