This volume of Bibliotheca Phycologica represents an exhaustive catalogue of the diversity of Oedogoniales in West Bengal, India.
Oedogonium is the most common genus of the order Oedogoniales of green algae established by Link in 1820. It is well known for its many stable and reliable characters and represents the only unbranched genus of the order; it represents more than 500 species. Apart from its free-flooating habit, the epiphytic species are not rare which helps the pollution phycologists to study the association characteristics and find out bioindicators. Geographical location, climatic conditions and the presence of abundant reservoirs in West Bengal provide an exceptional situation for enormous algal growth. Distributional records of taxa in India and abroad and descriptions of new taxa (species, varieties) complete the knowledge on this genus.
Together with The Genus Bulbochaete C. A. Agardh (Chlorophyta: Oedogoniales) in West Bengal (Bibliotheca Phycologica 114) The genus Oedogonium Link (Chlorophyta: Oedogoniales) in West Bengal, India rounds up the state of information on Oedogoniales.
Camera-lucida drawings detailing every reliable character including sculpturing of oospore wall and a dichotomous key to investigated taxa are of great value for biologists interested in algal taxonomy.
Abstract 4
Introduction 5
Review of the work done on the genus in India 6
New taxa of Oedogonium from India
Table 1 (Macrandrous homothallic taxa) 11
Table 2 (Macrandrous heterothallic taxa) 13
Table 3 (Nannandrous taxa) 17
Table 4 (Incompletely described taxa) 19
Key to the taxa described 21
Taxonomic description 26
Macrandrous taxa (poriferous) 26
Macrandrous taxa (operculate) 27
Macrandrous heterothallic taxa (poriferous) 32
Macrandrous heterothallic taxa (operculate) 37
Nannandrous taxa (poriferous) 60
Nannandrous taxa (operculate) 77
Acknowledgements 77
Literature 77
Plates 89
Taxonomic index 140