Study of Various Ecological Aspects on Digenetic Trematode Parasites in Important Food Fish Rita rita (Ham.) from Lucknow (India)

Fish fauna is an important component of fresh water ecosystem and considered as gold of water due to their high nutritional and economical value. However, high water pollution and disruption in water ecosystem causes parasite infections in fishes. Fishes bear heaviest burden of helminth parasites because these parasites use the fish for their shelter and food. Digeneans trematodes are important group of parasites which complete their life cycles in vertebrate and invertebrate host. Since, fishes are the important constituent of human food, these parasites readily passed to the human and causes various diseases. Therefore, it is very important to study the impact of various seasonal variations such as temperature, relative humidity and timeperiod on prevalence, mean intensity and relative density of trematode parasites infection in fishes. In this paper, we have systematically studied all these seasonal variations on the trematode parasites infection in common food fish Rita rita (Ham.) from January, 2009 to December, 2009 in Lucknow region of Uttar Pradesh. Our results suggest that the highest prevalence, mean intensity and relative density of trematode parasites infection occurred in summer season followed by rainy and winter season. KeywordsHelminth parasites, Digenean trematode, Seasonal variations, Rita rita (Ham.)