This study aimed to inventory the macroinvertebrates of soft substrates in Oran Bay, Algeria. 15 sampling stations were selected at depths between 27-30 meters. A total of 41 macroinvertebrate species were identified, with polychaetes making up 65.73% of individuals. Molluscs and crustaceans accounted for lower percentages. Principal component analysis showed that species composition correlated with organic matter content and low oxygen levels at different stations, with some pollution-tolerant species like Abra alba present. The macroinvertebrate community structure and species organization indicated an environment impacted by human activities like wastewater discharge. This inventory provides baseline data on coastal marine habitat quality in Oran Bay

1. RESEARCH JOURNAL OF FISHERIES AND HYDROBIOLOGY
2016. 11(7): 7-12
ISSN: 1816-9112
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To Cite This Article: Afaf BAKI, Ahmed KERFOUF, Chafik MHAMDIA, Mustapha Mahmoud DIF, Sofiane BOUAZZA.,
Inventory of macroinvertebrates soft substrates of oran bay (Algeria, NW).. Research Journal Of Fisheries And
Hydrobiology, 11(7): 7-12, 2016
Inventory of macroinvertebrates soft
substrates of Oran Bay (Algeria, NW).
1Afaf BAKI, 2Ahmed KERFOUF, 3Chafik MHAMDIA, 4Mustapha Mahmoud DIF, 5Sofiane BOUAZZA
Laboratoire d’éco-développement des espaces, Département des sciences de l’environnement,
Address For Correspondence:
Afaf BAKI, Laboratoire d’éco-développement des espaces, Département des sciences de l’environnement
E-mail : Baki_afaf@yahoo.com
Received May 2016; Accepted 25 July 2016; Available 28 July 2016
A B S T R A C T
Background: The coast of Oran, which has some 120 kilometers, or 10 % of Algerian coast is a place of trade and cultural exchange, its
climate and its geographical position favored the establishment of human settlements and activities. Objective: In this study we have used
of benthic macro fauna in general and macro invertebrates as indicators (descriptor) of the state of the marine environment pollution by
making an inventory of macro invertebrate's soft substrates Bay Oran. Results: Our results highlight 41 species of which 65, 73% of
polichetes ,% of mollusc and crustaceans. Conclusion: We considered that results an indicator of coastal marine environments pollution
Key words: bio-indices, pollution, inventory, furniture macro-invertebrates bay Oran substrates
INTRODUCTION
The Oran coast is considered one of the "hot spots" of the marine Mediterranean biodiversity. The
uniqueness of the Oran coast comes from a combination of historical characteristic, morphological, ecological,
biotic and anthropogenic chemicals [6].
The Oran coast has a major ecological interest and plays an important role throughout the Mediterranean
marine ecosystem. It has wealthy habitats landscape very remarkable submarines. This is due to the
geographical proximity of the Oran region by contribution to the Strait of Gibraltar benefiting from significant
enrichment from the movement of horizontal and vertical currents that sweep the coast (current "front of Oran")
The wastewater discharge problem in nature remains intact in Oran, in fact, 400 wastewater discharge
points are identified in the province over 90 million cubic meters of wastewater which is discharged annually on
the Oran coast and 68,000 m3
of industrial wastewater are dumped daily into the sea. Thus ,its reported on an
extent of damage caused by the situation on the marine ecosystem and fish stocks With regular volume of over 7
million m3
per month of waste water, that's all the coastline is threatened with aggravated pollution and
irreversible environmental marine degradation.
Faced with multiple damage caused to the marine environment, the interests of the scientific community has
turned to assessing the stage of destruction of the environment at different points of the globe.
Thus, similar research was one in California [17], France [3,8], Sweden [18], Greece [20], Great Britain
[19] in European waters [5] show that the study of the distribution of macrozoobentiques species is a fairly
accurate method and easy to use that information on the middle level of disturbance. Thus, the benthic
macrofauna is revealed as a good indicator of changes in the environment.

2. 8 Afaf BAKI et al, 2016/
Benthic macrofauna are considered indicator species Pollution excel
benthic macrofauna of the Algerian coast furniture substrates remain very weak and localized coastal fund
[14,1,12,13, 2].
II - Presentation of the study area:
1) Description and location:
Our study area is the Bay of
occupies a portion of one third of the Algerian coast and is located in the north western part of Algeria. The
scope of the latter is around 180 kilometers and an average width of 20
Fig. 1: Localization of the study area
It offers a variable morphological structure and tormented on about regular underpinned by an imaginary
diameter of Cape Falcon in the west to Cape Aiguille east, where alternating with a percentage equivalent to
little meadows rocky coasts (54%) and low c
At the bottom of the bay of Oran is the port of Oran (Geographic Coordinates: 00 ° 37 ° 35'43'135''N
675'00''W) between the tip of the needle Jebel Kristel east and Cape Falcon northwest of Ain El Turk.
This port is for industrial use, with two docks fishermen whose linear quay is 750 m. Several emissaries of
wastewater (urban and industrial) resulting from the Oran metropolitan area are located in the port and
neighborhoods.
This port is for industrial use, with two dock
wastewater (urban and industrial) resulting from the Oran metropolitan area are located in the port and
neighborhoods.
A-Sampling, measurements and sifting
The removal of the sediment was carried out with a bucket type VAN VEEN which allows quantitative
samples of benthic macrofauna on a surface of the substrate 1/4 m².
15 stations were selected randomly with a depth that varies between 27 m and 30 m.
An initial screening is performed using a sieve with 1 mm mesh side under a jet of sea water; the refusal of
the sieve of each station is fixed at 10% formalin (neutralization) and stored in labeled jars with all the
information about each sample.
Research Journal Of Fisheries And Hydrobiology 11(7
Benthic macrofauna are considered indicator species Pollution excellence. Wheraeas
benthic macrofauna of the Algerian coast furniture substrates remain very weak and localized coastal fund
Our study area is the Bay of Oran; it represents a wide open basin to the Mediterranean. Its coastline
occupies a portion of one third of the Algerian coast and is located in the north western part of Algeria. The
scope of the latter is around 180 kilometers and an average width of 20 to 25 Km (Fig. 01).
Localization of the study area
It offers a variable morphological structure and tormented on about regular underpinned by an imaginary
diameter of Cape Falcon in the west to Cape Aiguille east, where alternating with a percentage equivalent to
little meadows rocky coasts (54%) and low coasts of loose materials (46%) [7].
At the bottom of the bay of Oran is the port of Oran (Geographic Coordinates: 00 ° 37 ° 35'43'135''N
675'00''W) between the tip of the needle Jebel Kristel east and Cape Falcon northwest of Ain El Turk.
industrial use, with two docks fishermen whose linear quay is 750 m. Several emissaries of
wastewater (urban and industrial) resulting from the Oran metropolitan area are located in the port and
This port is for industrial use, with two docks fishermen whose linear quay is 750 m. Several emissaries of
wastewater (urban and industrial) resulting from the Oran metropolitan area are located in the port and
MATERIALS AND METHODS
Sampling, measurements and sifting:
of the sediment was carried out with a bucket type VAN VEEN which allows quantitative
samples of benthic macrofauna on a surface of the substrate 1/4 m².
15 stations were selected randomly with a depth that varies between 27 m and 30 m.
screening is performed using a sieve with 1 mm mesh side under a jet of sea water; the refusal of
the sieve of each station is fixed at 10% formalin (neutralization) and stored in labeled jars with all the
7), July, Pages: 7-12
Wheraeas the work on the
benthic macrofauna of the Algerian coast furniture substrates remain very weak and localized coastal fund
it represents a wide open basin to the Mediterranean. Its coastline
occupies a portion of one third of the Algerian coast and is located in the north western part of Algeria. The
to 25 Km (Fig. 01).
It offers a variable morphological structure and tormented on about regular underpinned by an imaginary
diameter of Cape Falcon in the west to Cape Aiguille east, where alternating with a percentage equivalent to
At the bottom of the bay of Oran is the port of Oran (Geographic Coordinates: 00 ° 37 ° 35'43'135''N
675'00''W) between the tip of the needle Jebel Kristel east and Cape Falcon northwest of Ain El Turk.
industrial use, with two docks fishermen whose linear quay is 750 m. Several emissaries of
wastewater (urban and industrial) resulting from the Oran metropolitan area are located in the port and
s fishermen whose linear quay is 750 m. Several emissaries of
wastewater (urban and industrial) resulting from the Oran metropolitan area are located in the port and
of the sediment was carried out with a bucket type VAN VEEN which allows quantitative
screening is performed using a sieve with 1 mm mesh side under a jet of sea water; the refusal of
the sieve of each station is fixed at 10% formalin (neutralization) and stored in labeled jars with all the

3. 9 Afaf BAKI et al, 2016/ Research Journal Of Fisheries And Hydrobiology 11(7), July, Pages: 7-12
Fig. 2: location of samples in the study area
B-Treatment of samples to the laboratory:
The sample is first washed with tap water on a sieve of a mm mesh side; the refusal of the sieve is then
poured into a white tray (contrast effect). Sorting itself takes place using fine forceps and is to collect different
species macrozoobenthic and separate into Polychètes, molluscs, crustaceans ... ..
Harvested species are kept in pill containing 10% formalin and carrying a label indicating the zoological
group, date and sample number.
C - Species Recognition:
This recognition is made in two or three steps: sorting under the binocular and identification of large
individuals.
Identification is made to the rank of species with a count of the number of individuals per species.
The systematic position of the species is affected by referring to specialized documentation, including:
Lincoln [15], Zariquiey [21], Nordsieck [16], George et al. [11] and Zenetos Bogdanos [20], Fisher et al. [10],
Bellan-Santini [4].
D- Statistical study:
The ordination methods were applied to the raw data to extract most of the information they contain to
provide graphic representations that facilitate the interpretation of results.
Principal component analysis (PCA) were performed, CPA uses Euclidean distance and can distinguish
groups of stations (observations) with similar levels of abundance.
In order to have a exploratory broader vision, analysis was complemented by an ascending hierarchical
classification (AHC)
RESULTS AND DISCUSSING
Distribution of zoological groups:
Fig. 3: Density distribution of macro invertebrate in the various stations studied
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15
Abondance(%)
Stations
polychaete
molluscs
Crustacean

4. 10 Afaf BAKI et al, 2016/ Research Journal Of Fisheries And Hydrobiology 11(7), July, Pages: 7-12
The distribution of different zoological groups of macro invertebrate biomass soft substrates golf Oran, are
shown in the following graph:
The density distribution of the macro invertebrate in different study sites call the following observation:
The zoological group is represented quantitatively by the polychaete which dominates almost all stations.
The average densities of all the stations studied polychaete represents 65, 73%. The highest values are recorded
in fourth station with (77%). the lowest values (58%) of the station 15.
Quantitatively, molluscs come in second place, in the station 05, also records a very high proportion of
molluscs, 35%, the minimum for this group are recorded at both stations St 04 and St 10, with 16%.
The crustacean group is presented by low percentage, thus it good presented in station 11. whreaeas this
group is absent at station 05
The proportion of crustaceans and molluscs is almost the same in the stations 10 and 11
The dendrogram Bay Oran perfectly reflected its situation, that means that there no set or subset does
individualizes consistently, either on the basis of the location of the stations, neither from their exposure the
sources of pollution
Fig. 4: CHA of different station distribution
The different stations are distributed very randomly confirming organization mosaic of benthic soft
substrates Bay of Oran.
The dendrogram Bay Oran isolated one distinct set:
It is divided into two subsets; the first isolated himself at the right end of the dendrogram and only two
species;
The second distinguishes two groups in their interiors, other subgroups are individualized.
Most taxa inventoried in this study are relatively common in the Algerian coast. The structure assemblies
primarily related to physicochemical characteristics of the environment in which we find them.
The assemblies of the Bay of Oran are so dominated by particular species, identified by kerfouf 2007 and
grimes (2010) as characteristic assemblies species encountered in medium to high organic contamination.

5. 11 Afaf BAKI et al, 2016/ Research Journal Of Fisheries And Hydrobiology 11(7), July, Pages: 7-12
Fig. 5: PCA of the correlation between different stations and pollutions factor
The ACP conducted for the rate of organic matter (01 component) can show that the majority of species
correlate positively ditto for the second component (low oxygen) pushing some species to correlate positively
Among the most important species identified, the procession of species classified called pollution-tolerant
features such as Abra alba.
This species occupies the muddy bottom and sandy bottoms in heterogeneous sediment, silt and sandy silt
foul which make a first indicator about chemical pollution, organic, mineral, thermal and biological, it is
presented only at certain intensive bacterial sectors activity shows a strong resistance to extreme conditions and
supports low oxygen concentrations.
This species is as such considered an excellent indicator of the impact of human activities in the coastal
marine ecosystem [3], including the metal pollution.
Corbula gibba is a sedimentary instability indicator, unstable backgrounds and environments rich in organic
matter and in anoxic conditions .
C. gibba lives in fine sediments silted and organic vases.
especially in confined port community. PICARD (1965) points out in the sediment enriched with organic
matter. FREDJ and AL. (2002) noted the ability of this species to occupy relatively large depths and reported
between 0 to 1000 m. C. gibba generally reaches a total length of 9 mm.
Corbula gibba is an indicator of pollution bio-, turbidity and low levels of oxygen in the benthic community
(REBZANI-ZAHAF, 2003). YONGE PRUVOT and AL. (2000) showed the presence of Corbula gibba in
sediments from Dunkirk next community Abra alba
Conclusion:
The Oran coast and wetlands are the principal receptacles of polluted waters. Despite the existence of legal
instruments prohibiting all forms of pollution, the discharge of sewage into the bay of Oran continues to pose a
serious problem..
With the structure of benthic communities and organization of species in these stands it is possible to assess
the overall quality of the environment through structural bio-indices. this study had contribute to make an
inventory of macro invertebrates soft substrates Bay of Oran, which is considered a good indicator of disruption
of coastal marine environments

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