Fish biodiversity of Indian Exclusive Economic Zone

Joshi, K K and Sethulakshmi, M and Varsha, M S (2017) Fish biodiversity of Indian Exclusive Economic Zone. In: Winter School on Structure and Function of the Marine Ecosystem : Fisheries, 1-21 December 2017, Kochi.

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Abstract

Indian fisheries have a long history, starting with Kautilya’s Arthasastra describing fish as a source for consumption and provide evidence that fishery was a well-established industry in India and fish was relished as an article of diet as early as 300 B.C, the ancient Hindus possessed a considerable knowledge of the habit of fishes and the epic on the second pillar of Emperor Ashoka describing the prohibition of consumption of fish during a certain lunar period which can be interpreted as a conservation point of view. Modern scientific studies on Indian fishes could be traced to the initial works done by Linnaeus, Bloch and Schneider, Lacepède, Russell and Hamilton. The mid 1800s contributed much in the history of Indian fish taxonomy since the time of the expeditions was going through. Cuvier and Valenciennes (1828-1849) described 70 nominal species off Puducherry, Skyes (1839), Günther (1860, 1872, 1880) and The Fishes of India by Francis Day (1865-1877) and another book Fauna of British India Series in two volumes (1889) describing 1,418 species are the two most indispensable works on Indian fish taxonomy to date. Alcock (1889, 1890) described 162 species new to science from Indian waters.

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