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Journal of Threatened Taxa Building evidence for conservaton globally www.threatenedtaxa.org ISSN 0974-7907 (Online) | ISSN 0974-7893 (Print) Communication Chroococcalean blue green algae from the paddy fields of Satara District, Maharashtra, India Sharada Jagannath Ghadage & Vaneeta Chandrashekhar Karande 26 October 2020 | Vol. 12 | No. 14 | Pages: 16979–16992 DOI: 10.11609/jot.5683.12.14.16979-16992 For Focus, Scope, Aims, Policies, and Guidelines visit htps://threatenedtaxa.org/index.php/JoTT/about/editorialPolicies#custom-0 For Artcle Submission Guidelines, visit htps://threatenedtaxa.org/index.php/JoTT/about/submissions#onlineSubmissions For Policies against Scientfc Misconduct, visit htps://threatenedtaxa.org/index.php/JoTT/about/editorialPolicies#custom-2 For reprints, contact <[email protected]> The opinions expressed by the authors do not refect the views of the Journal of Threatened Taxa, Wildlife Informaton Liaison Development Society, Zoo Outreach Organizaton, or any of the partners. 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Member Threatened Taxa Journal of Threatened Taxa | www.threatenedtaxa.org | 26 October 2020 | 12(14): 16979–16992 ISSN 0974-7907 (Online) | ISSN 0974-7893 (Print) PLATINUM OPEN ACCESS DOI: htps://doi.org/10.11609/jot.5683.12.14.16979-16992 #5683 | Received 06 January 2020 | Final received 06 September 2020 | Finally accepted 20 September 2020 C o m Chroococcalean blue green algae from the paddy felds of Satara District, m u n Maharashtra, India i c 1 2 a Sharada Jagannath Ghadage & Vaneeta Chandrashekhar Karande t i Department of Botany, Yashwantrao Chavan Insttute of Science, Tal Karad, Satara District, Maharashtra 415001, India. o 1 [email protected] (corresponding author), 2 [email protected] n Abstract: Blue green algae are the photosynthetc prokaryotes representng a wide distributon in habitat, i.e., temperate, tropical, and polar region. Paddy felds are the best studied aquatc ecosystems on earth which fulfll all the necessary demands required for blue green algal growth. Blue green algal role in enhancement of paddy yield has been studied worldwide. Sustainable utlizaton of an organism for community use depends on how successfully the ecology of that organism is understood. Twenty-eight chroococcalean blue green algal taxa were recorded from the study area. They were taxonomically investgated and found to belong to two families and 11 genera. The frst family Chroococcaceae was the largest family with 10 genera and 26 species while the second family Entophysalidaceae had only one genus and two species. The genus Gloeocapsa from the family Chroococcaceae exhibited largest species diversity (21.42%), as well as taxa Chlorogloea fritschii of family Entophysalidaceae showed species abundance from the study area. All heterocystous blue green algal forms are capable of fxaton of atmospheric N2. Many of the non-heterocystous or unicellular blue green algae also have the capacity of N2 fxaton. The taxonomical documentaton of chroococcalean blue green algae provide informaton about such indigenous unicellular blue green algae which will help in the development of niche specifc inoculants as biofertlizers for rice felds of the study region. Keywords: Gloeocapsa, unicellular, biofertlizer, nitrogen fxaton, taxonomy. Editor: Asheesh Shivam Mishra, Nehru Gram Bharat (Deemed to be University), Prayagraj, India. Date of publicaton: 26 October 2020 (online & print) Citaton: Ghadage, S.J. & V.C. Karande (2020). Chroococcalean blue green algae from the paddy felds of Satara District, Maharashtra, India. Journal of Threatened Taxa 12(14): 16979–16992. htps://doi.org/10.11609/jot.5683.12.14.16979-16992 Copyright: © Ghadage & Karande 2020. Creatve Commons Atributon 4.0 Internatonal License. JoTT allows unrestricted use, reproducton, and distributon of this artcle in any medium by providing adequate credit to the author(s) and the source of publicaton. Funding: None. Competng interests: The authors declare no competng interests. Author details: Sharada Jagannath Ghadage graduated from the University of Kolhapur, Maharashtra and is currently a reasearcher with center for Yashwantrao Chavan Insttute of Science, Satara. She is working as a senior assistant professor in S.G.M. college, Karad, Maharashtra. She is currently working on one minor project - Efect of Azolla biofertlizer on soil quality and developmental stages of various crops. Funded by RUSA (In process). Dr. Mrs. Vaneeta Chandrashekhar Karande has 36 years experiance as a professor for PG and UG department in Botany subject Yashwantrao Chavan Insttute of Science, Satara, Maharashtra. She is Head of Botany department as well as Vice principal in Y. C. Insttute of Science, Satara and is a BOS member in Shivaji University, Kolhapur. She has completed two minor project on biodiversity of blue green algae. Author contributon: SJG—Conceptualized study, collected and analyzed data, wrote fnal version of menuscript translated in the feld. VCK—Supervised study, helped in the revision of menuscript. Acknowledgements: We are thankful to Dr. K. G. Kanade, Principal, Yashwantrao Chavan Insttute of Science, Satara for the encouragement during the work. Thanks are also due to the Head Department of Botany Y. C. Insttute of Science, Satara for the facilites. We are thankful to staf members and colleagues and friends for the keen interest and suggestons during this work. 16979 J TT Chroococcalean blue green algae from paddy felds of Satara District Ghadage & Karande INTRODUCTION Patan Tehsil is hilly with deep valleys while some parts are plains and receives heavy rainfall. The common soil Blue green algae are important components of soil is red lateritc soil, in the plains it is black cotony soil microfora in paddy felds. They play an important role while at elevatons it is the basaltc and lateritc type. in maintaining and improving soil fertlity, as they have This tehsil is famous for the cultvaton of local varietes the ability to fx atmospheric nitrogen and transform it of paddy, viz.: Dombya, Dodkya, Kolambya, Bhados, to nitrate/nitrite (Anand 1990). The rice felds provide Panwel, Indrayani, Champakali, Ghansal, Jiresal, Teliansh, ideal environment for luxuriant growth of blue-green Kaveri, Krishnakusal, Basmat, and Ambemohar. algae. They are found in paddy feld soil throughout the Karad is 52km to the south-east of Satara and is year at various growth stages of the rice crop (Nayak et located at 17.289N & 74.181E. Karad city situated at al. 2001). There is huge structural diversity found in class southern part of Satara District near Agashiva, at the Cyanophyta (blue green algae) which is the main reason confuence of Koyna and Krishna rivers called ‘Preet for atractng algologists to develop a keen interest in sangam’. The tehsil receives moderate rainfall and the their taxonomic study. common soil type is black cotony soil. It is famous for Extensive work on blue green algae of paddy felds the cultvaton of local varietes of rice, viz.: Indrayani, got in various parts of India (West Bengal, Kerala, Rethare Basmat, Pusa Basmat, Hansa, Khadkil Chatsgarh, Manipur, Mizoram, Utar Pradesh, Madhya Kolhapuri, Kolhapuri R-24, and Kaveri. Pradesh, Odisha, Tamil Nadu, and Maharashtra) and in Frequent and tmely collecton of soil and algal Bangladesh (Banarjee 1935; Goyal et al. 1984; Anand & samples were undertaken during the rainy season (2012– Revat 1987; Anand et al. 1987, 1995; Santra 1993; Sahu 2017). Soil samples were collected from paddy felds of et al. 1997; Ahmed 2001; Nayak et al. 2001). There are the study area (Fig. 1). Soil from rice felds were collected some reports on growth and nitrogen fxaton potentals randomly from both the tehsils as per Somawanshi et of blue green algae (Gupta 1964; Parasad & Mehrotra al. (1999). The collected soil samples were brought 1980; Santra 1991). Some workers recorded marked into the laboratory using polythene bags, dried at room variatons among the species of blue green algae from rice feld soils of diferent regions of India (Tiwari 1972; Sinha & Mukherjee 1975a,b, 1984; Anand et al. 1987). Several studies have been conducted on the blue green algal fora from the paddy felds of Maharashtra (Gonzalves et al. 1949; Sardeshpande & Goyal 1981; Kolte & Goyal 1985; Patl & Satav 1986; Madane & Shinde 1993; Aut & Pingle 2006; Patl & Chougule 2009). Ghadage & Karande (2008) and Kamble & Karande (2018) studied the unicellular blue green algae from various habitats of Satara District. Ghadage (2009), Karande (2009), Kamble (2010), and Ghadage & Karande (2019), however, studied the biodiversity of blue green algae from paddy felds of Satara District. Though substantal studies were available in Satara District, it seems that much atenton was not paid to the study of chroococcalean blue green algae. Thus, the present study was designed to view the systematc enumeraton of chroococcalean