Assessment of Climate Factors on Benthic Fauna in Jabi Lake Federal Capital Territory Abuja

Abstract

Studies of climate factors on benthic fauna in Jabi Lake was conducted from November, 2016 to June, 2017 using combination of insitu and laboratory equipment. Three stations were selected to determine the climate characteristics based on activities in the various stations and proximity to terrestrial influence. The results of the climatic parameters showed that atmospheric temperature range 18.40 to 32.100C, rainfall from 1997-2016 range from 0.00 to 513.8mm, relative humidity range from 22.00 to 72.20%, wind speed range from 0.40 to 3.40m/s, variation with time in all the stations. There were significant differences (P<0.05) between these parameters, within the months, stations and seasons. A total of 1, 867 benthic fauna were collected and identified into 6 phyla, 27 families and 60 species. All the species identify were represented in all the stations. Faunistic composition and abundance of benthic fauna showed that Family Bithyniidae has the highest percentage composition 60% (1120) followed by Lymnaelidae and Nuculoidae with 4% each. Chironmidae has 3% while others has 2 to 1%. Similarity ratio computed by Jaccard’s similarities index (0.63) shows that the three stations has about 63% species similarities between them. The relationship between climatic variable and fauna in the CCA diagram shows only torant organisms on positive axis i.e. representative of Nematoda, Mollusca, Polifera and Annelida has affinity to variables while Crustacean and Arthropoda were senstive to environmental condition. The Shannon Weiner species diversity index is 0.96 which is quite high.