oa Diatoms & Dinoflagellates Associated with Seagrasses, Algae and Mangrove

Marine environments sustain a variety of living organisms starting from microorganisms up to large macro-organisms. This support comes with the diversity of marine habitats that are created naturally to provide certain conditions for each single organism. However, Mangrove areas are one of many important places that are considered to be highly productive and could be suitable for planktonic life. Mangroves can be defined as salt tolerant plants that grow on the coasts and in shallow water. There are many types of plankton such as Diatoms & Dinoflagellate (Phytoplankton) that may be found in Mangrove areas (N. M. Nour El-Din & J. A. Al-Khayat, 2005). The presence of Diatoms & Dinoflagellate could be related to the occurrence of floating detritus in which Diatoms & Dinoflagellate can be found in association with them (Faust, M., & Gulledge, R. 1995). Moreover, Planktons can also be found attached to the seagrasses and Algae along the shallow shorelines. The presence of such planktonic type is affected by temperature and salinity so; such floating environments will be used to examine this effectiveness at shallow mangrove areas and along the coast area. Mangroves, Algae and seagrasses are found sometimes suspended in the water column and they start to move up and down due to the generation of Oxygen bubbles. (Faust, M. & Gulledge, R. 1995). Because of that, we will collect them only at the daytime. Thus, we will look at the species composition and how they will be affected by the variation of temperature and light in different seasons (summer (2015), spring and fall) and identifying any invasive species. Samples will be collected from three coastlines around Qatar (Al-Thakiera, Fwiret and Al-Wakra) and will be observed using light and electron microscope. The importance of this study is to show and identify benthic diatoms and dinoflagellates species and to have data about the harmful types because they affect fish stocks and water quality, in order to avoid having these two main problems on Qatari waters.