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An investigation was carried out to assess the status and diversity of small indigenous species (SIS) of fish in the upper reaches of the river Brahmaputra, Assam. The study was carried out for two years from January, 2013 to December, 2014 in five prominent landing stations. A total of 52 SIS of fish belonging to 15 families and 33 genera were recorded during the study period. Cyprinidae was observed to be the most dominant family with 22 species (42.31%). According to IUCN status (2015), species like Amblyceps arunchalensis and Puntius fraseri were listed as endangered species. It has been observed that the SIS were most abundant during pre-monsoon period and least abundant during winter season in the area of the river under study. The study also revealed that the upper reaches of river Brahmaputra is fairly rich in SIS fish diversity. However, better management strategies such as controlled harvest and scientific fishing policies will ensure sustainable exploitation and conservation of SIS fish in the region.

Length-weight relationships (LWRs) are presented for two fish species: Schistura fasciata Vishwanath, 2011 and Schistura reticulofasciata (Singh and Bănărescu, 1982), sampled from the Simsang River in Meghalaya, India. Fishes were caught seasonally from January to December 2015, with cast nets (10-15 mm mesh size) and electrofishing devices. The b values in the LWRs were determined as 3.09 for S. fasciata and 3.318 for S. reticulofasciata. | 1037TALUKDAR eT AL. a digital slide calliper (Mitutoyo, CD-8″CSX) to the nearest 0.01 mm and the values converted into centimetres. Body weight was taken with an electronic balance (TP 303, Denver Instrument, Germany) to the nearest 0.01 g. The relationships between total length and weight were determined through linear-regression equation of log TW = log a + b log TL. Log-log plots within species were done to remove outliers using SPSS 17.0 (SPSS Inc. Ltd., Sacramento, California). The 95% confidence limits for b (CL 95%) were calculated to determine if the hypothetical value fell between these limits (Froese, 2006). | RESULTSDescriptive statistics and estimated LWR parameters for the two fish species from Simsang River are shown in Table 1. A total of 200 specimens (S. fasciata = 69, S. reticulofasciata = 131) were used to estimate the LWRs. | DISCUSSIONNo LWR data are available for either of the two species in FishBase (Froese & Pauly, 2016). The 'b' values for S. fasciata and S. reticulofasciata (calculated as 3.09 and 3.318, respectively) were within the expected range of 2.5-3.5 (Froese, 2006). Comparing the results for the two species against the Bayesian approach, parameter 'a' was found to be within the expected range for elongated fish species (i.e. 0.0018-0.00842 95% range of a) (Froese, Thorson, & Reyes, 2013).

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