Report of the Special Scientific Team to Andaman and Nicobar Islands to give research support to thrust areas in fisheries

Realising the importance and urgent need for judicious exploitation and utilization of the marine living resources of the Andaman and Nicobar seas, the Director General, Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) as Chairman of the Central Coordinating Committee for Survery of Living Resources had recommended at the first meeting of the committee, held in May 1988 that the Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute (CMFRI) should depute its scientists to the Central Agricultural Research Institute for Andaman and Nicobar Islands (CARI), Port Blair on a fixed tenure basis to support the R&D thrust in fisheries in the region. Consequent to this, from 1-8 March 1989 the Director, CMFRI made a visit to the Andaman and Nicobar Islands to make an on-the-spot study of the potentials and possibilities for marine fisheries development in the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) of the Bay Islands. Special attention was paid to the requirements of CARI in marine fisheries research. The Director also met and discussed with senior policy and decision makers in the Andaman and Nicobar Administration. As a result, two scientific teams with specific objectives were constituted. This is the report of the first team

A report on window pane oyster fishery in Tuticorin bay

The window pane oyster (Placenta placenta) are fished regularly for pearls and shells from Kakinada Bay of Andhra Pradesh and Okhamandal Coast of Gulf of Kutch

Determinants of perceived auditor independence for Malaysian financially distressed companies

The determinants of perceived auditor independence were identified for financially distressed companies in Malaysia. These determinants included country-specific variables such as ethnicity – specifically, of the external auditor, directors, and majority shareholders - and political connection. A survey captured the perceptions of practitioners registered with the Malaysian Institute of Accountants and the data was factor analyzed. The focus on financially distressed companies and the inclusion of country-specific variables resulted in a different combination of determinants from existing auditor independence literature

Role and acceptability of traditional birth attendants (DAIs) in a rural community in South India

Dais are the traditional birth attendants, conducting deliveries at home in the majority of villages in India. A study was planned to find out the feasibility of utilising the services of the dais in case-finding in Tuberculosis (TB) and for drug delivery to diagnosed patients. As a preliminary step, a survey was done with a view to find out the role and acceptability of the dais by the community in 5% of households in randomly selected 24 of the 48 villages in Sriperumbudur taluk in Tamil Nadu, where a voluntary organisation. "PREPARE" was delivering primary health care through dais. A total of 466 individuals, either the head of the household or any other responsible person available, were interviewed to find out the role and acceptability of the dais by the community. The salient findings of this study are that 83% mentioned that the dais reside in their respective villages. hence the services of the dais were available at ail times and 82 % had stated that the services were useful to them. This background information is essential for health planners so that this task force could be effectively utilised in health programmmes, in the rural areas in India

Influence of wind speed on surface layer stability and turbulent fluxes over southern Indian peninsula station

Surface to atmosphere exchange has received much attention in numerical weather prediction models. This exchange is defined by turbulent parameters such as frictional velocity, drag coefficient and heat fluxes, which have to be derived experimentally from high-frequency observations. High-frequency measurements of wind speed, air temperature and water vapour mixing ratio (eddy covariance measurements), were made during the Integrated Ground Observation Campaign (IGOC) of Cloud Aerosol Interaction and Precipitation Enhancement Experiment (CAIPEEX) at Mahabubnagar, India (16∘44′N, 77∘59′E) in the south-west monsoon season. Using these observations, an attempt was made to investigate the behaviour of the turbulent parameters, mentioned above, with respect to wind speed. We found that the surface layer stability derived from the Monin–Obukhov length scale, is well depicted by the magnitude of wind speed, i.e., the atmospheric boundary layer was under unstable regime for wind speeds >4 m s−1; under stable regime for wind speeds <2 m s−1 and under neutral regime for wind speeds in the range of 2–3 m s−1. All the three stability regimes were mixed for wind speeds 3–4 m s−1. The drag coefficient shows scatter variation with wind speed in stable as well as unstable conditions

Some aspects of physiology of pearl oyster

Pearl oysters of the genus Pinctada occur in different environments, from the intertidal zone to shallow coastal waters as well as at depths of 12-23 m as on the pearl banks of Gulf of Ma:nnar. A knowledge of the physiological characteristics of pearl oyster is necessary for successful rearing in the farm as well as for production of quality pearls. Realising this, several studies have bsen carried out on the physiology of Pinctada fucata of the Japanese seas. Itoh (1976) has studied the relation of oxygen consumption and ammonia nitrogen excreted in the adult oyster to body size and water temperature

Pearl oyster resources of India

The pearl oysters belong to the genus Pinctada Roding under the family Pteriidae. They enjoy a world wide distribution occurring in almost all the seas of the tropical belt and also in the subtropical region. Six species of pearl oysters occur in the Indian waters viz., Pinctada fucata (Gould), P. margaritifera (Linnaeus), P. chemnitzii (Philippi), P. sugillata (Reeve), P. anomioides (Reeve) and P. atropurpurea (Dunker), of which P. fucata alone has contributed to the pearl fisheries in the Gulf of Mannar and Gulf of Kutch. P. fucata is distributed in the Red Sea, Persian Gulf and the Indian and Pacific Oceans

Larval rearing and production of spat of pearl oyster Pinctada fucata (Gould)

The Indian pearl oyster Pinctada fucata was spawned in the laboratory and the larvae were successfully reared to spat setting under tropical conditions. The larve grows through the straight-hinge, umbo, eye spot and pediveliger stages in the pelagic phase before metamorphosing to plantigrade and setting on a substratum as spat, and these stages are described. Large differences were noticed in larval growth within and between four rearing experiments. Isochrysis galbana was used as standard food throughout larval rearing at a cell concentration range 80–350/μl. Spatfall occurred on day 24–32 on a variety of substrata. The highest density of 4.71/cm2 was observed on fibreglass tank bottom. Growth of P. fucata larvae appears to be a step function, and that of spat up to 13 weeks describes a curvilinear form

A note on the predation on pearl oyster Pinctada fucata (Gould) by some gastropods

Considerabli; mortality of young pearl oyster, Pinctada fucata, was noticed on the oyster beds in Gulf of Mannar due to predation by gastropods, Cymatium cingulatum and Murex virgineus. Pearl oysters reared in the farm also suffered mortality, due to accidental transplantation of C. cingulatum while stocking