Exposure to outside air microorganisms especially fungi has been linked with illness such as allergic respiratory symptoms, rhinitis, asthma, and infection such as mycosis. Airborne fungal composition was sampled from five locations in Lagos State, Nigeria, between May 2014 and April 2016. Fungi spores were collected using the sedimentation plate method with the Petri dishes of dichloran-glycerol 18 (DG-18) and potato dextrose agar (PDA) media. Fungi sporulated faster on DG-18 agar plate as compared with PDA. The abundances of fungal spores collected monthly at the locations varied. The most abundant spores came from the fungi were Aspergillus niger (14.47%), Aspergillus sydowii (10.37%), and Aspergillus flavus (7.93%). Additional species were present in the collections including Ascomycetes: Penicillium funiculosum (5.49%), Neurospora crassa (5.32%), Penicillium oxalicum (4.71%), Penicillium pinophilum (2.88%), Fusarium verticillioides (3.05%), Penicillium simplicissimum (1.83%), Aphaderanum sp. (0.22%), Curvularia sp. (0.22%), Aspergillus oryzae (0.22%), and Paecilomyces sp. (0.61%) and the Mucoromycotina Zygomycetes: Rhizopus oryzae (4.10%) and Mucor sp. (3.44%). Fungal concentrations were significantly higher (P ≤ 0.05) during the rainy season compared with the dry season. Aspergillus and Penicillium were the most predominant airborne fungal genera while Mucor, Alternaria, and Cladosporium were some of the least observed. Generally, abundance of fungi was significantly high during the wet season in all the studied locations.

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Attempts at reconstructing palaeoclimatic changes over time using palynomorphs of three oil wells drilled in the shallow offshore Niger Delta led to cluster analysis-aided recognition of seven pollen zones. These pollen zones are equivalent to ten palaeoclimatic zones with alternating dry and wet conditions. The palynomorphs were classified into phytoecological groups and changes in their relative abundances were employed to interpret the palaeoclimatic conditions of their source areas. Contrasting fluctuations in the proportions of the Spore (Pteridophytes) phytoecological group and those of the Poaceae were the main basis for palaeoclimatic inferences. Trends of the occurrence of other phytoecological groups were used to substantiate our palaeoclimatic inferences. In the latest Miocene (5.8–5.5 Ma), climatic conditions were mainly wet until between 5.5 and 5.0 Ma, when extreme dry conditions prevailed. The early Pliocene part (5.0–>3.4 Ma) was generally wet, while the late Pliocene part (<3.0–2.7 Ma) was extremely dry, with wet conditions re-occurring at the latest Pliocene/earliest Pleistocene boundary at a lower magnitude than those of the early Pliocene. This is inferred from the bloom of open vegetation Acanthaceae undif., Polygala sp. and Asystacia gangetica, along with montane Podocarpus milanjianus from 2.4 Ma through 2.0 Ma and younger. The Acanthaceae bloom recorded the evolution of A. gangetica in the latest Pliocene/earliest Pleistocene at around 2.0 Ma in the Niger Delta. The upper Early Pliocene regional wet event is associated with distinct peaks of riverine forest, freshwater swamp and mangrove pollen. Our results further support earlier findings from other parts of West Africa with respect to palaeoclimatic changes in the late Neogene/earliest Quaternary. Equivalent qualitative palynostratigraphic events were recognized within the pollen zones which are useful for age determination, and the significance of biostratigraphic correlation of the zones is stressed.

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