Habitat and Population Density of Lingula anatina (Brachiopoda) - A Living Fossil from Subarnarekha Estuary, Orissa

Abstract

Lingula is one of the oldest living genus belonging to the phylum Brachiopoda commonly known as 'Lamp shell'. Lingula anatina Lamarck, 1801 is a rare and primitive animal that occurs as patchy distribution in Indian coasts and estuaries. Soota and Reddy (1976) reported Lingula sp. from Talsari, the western most part of the Subarnarekha estuary. During the faunistic survey in Subarnarekha Estuary (2006-09), a vast Lingula bed was noticed (Mitra et al., 2010) besides the narrow creeks, surrounded by mangroves and salt marshes from Talsari to Kirtania. In this estuary, the habitat of Lingula anatina is generally soft muddy, sometimes with black soil (decomposed) and sand mixed mud. Juveniles inhabit in fine soft mud only.