Checklist of cyanoprokaryotes and algae in the large tropical River Congo (Africa)

Abstract

This study presents data on the floristic composition of cyanoprokaryotes/  cyanobacteria and algae in the tropical River Congo, the second longest river in Africa after the Nile, which at global scale is the second most important river after Amazon in terms of  drainage basin size and freshwater discharge. The results in this paper are based only on the  materials collected from the mainstem of the middle part of the River Congo, in a stretch of 1,450 km, in two sampling campaigns conducted in contrasting hydrologic conditions: in the high water (HW) period, in December 2013 (33 sites), and in the low, falling water (FW) period in June 2014 (38 sites). Totally 520 taxa of 7 divisions (Cyanoprokaryota - 76, Cryptophyta - 1, Euglenophyta -17, Pyrrhophyta - 8, Chlorophyta - 108, Streptophyta - 38, Ochrophyta - 272: 242 Bacillariophyceae, 24 Chrysophyceae, 1 Synurophyceae, 3 Tribophyceae and 2  Eustigmatophyceae), were identified in the phytoplankton samples but few of them (16) were strictly tropical. Algal diversity was higher during the FW (431 taxa) compared with HW (314  taxa) and floristic similarity between both periods was only 57% based on 213 common taxa. According to the frequency of distribution, most of the phytoplankters occurred rarely and  only two diatoms were found in all sites during both studied periods: Aulacoseira ambigua and  Nitzschia lancettula. They were followed by the widespreadAulacoseira agassizii, A. granulata var. angustissima, Nitzschia cf. lacuum, Staurosirella leptostauron and Staurosirella pinnata. Cyanoprokaryotes and chlorophytes were found along the whole river flow, but with different  species composition. 

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