an empirical study of the ecology and morphotaxanomy of acanthocephalan parasites of fishes in context of jharkhand state

Abstract

A three-year survey (September 2019 to August 2022) was performed. Four quarterly samples of C. punctatus (Bloch) and C. striatus (Bloch) were collected from winter (December-February), autumn (September November), summer (March-May) and rainy season (June-August), The study aimed to investigate the seasonal variations in helminth parasites infecting two species of snake head fishes, Channa punctatus and Channa striatus, collected at Ranchi Jharkhand, India. Over the course of a three-year survey, 1013 Channa punctatus and 247 Channa striatus individuals were gathered and examined for the study. The existence of helminth parasites, such as trematodes, nematodes, cestodes, and acanthocephalans, was investigated in the fish. The following factors were examined for every parasite group: host specificity, mean intensity of infection, and parasite prevalence. The incidence and mean degree of helminth parasite infection in Channa punctatus and Channa striatus varied significantly by season, according to the research. Pallisentis sp. was most common in the summer, whereas trematodes, nematodes, and cestodes were most common in the autumn. Nematode mean prevalence peaked in the summer season. There are 12 morphotaxonomic species identified in this study. These were Pallisentis amini, P. meyeri, P. Ranchiensis, P. Daltonganensis, P. anadai, P. Ratuensis, P. Dorandaensis, P. Jamshedpurensis. P. Kankensis, Acanthosentis Ormanjhiensis, A. seenghalae and Neoechinorhynchinus Dighaensis. Amplification of 185 rDNA gene resulted in nucleotide sequences of 865 938 base pair. GenBank accession number of isolated and retrieved sequences were analysed. Average percentage identity among most similar taxa retrieved from NCBI nucleotide BLAST and targeted gene sequence calculated independently.