Title Page
Contents
Abstract 10
1. Introduction 12
2. Materials and Methods 15
2.1. Location and sampling methods 15
2.2. Zooplankton analysis 16
2.3. Data analysis 17
3. Results 19
3.1. Temperature and Salinity 19
3.2. Zooplankton composition 26
3.3. Seasonal distribution of zooplankton densities 32
3.4. Zooplankton structure and environmental parameters 34
3.5. Cluster analysis 34
4. Discussion 40
6. References 43
Appendices 9
Appendix 1. Zooplankton abundance in Lobito during hot season 52
Appendix 2. Zooplankton abundance in Lobito during cold season 56
Table 1. Location of sampling stations in Lobito area 17
Table 2. Seasonal changes of abundance in zooplankton groups 30
Table 3. Seasonal dominant species in contributing total zooplankton abundance in Lobito 31
Table 4. Significant correlation coefficients of dominant copepod species with... 38
Figure 1. Study area and sampling stations in Lobito-Angola 16
Figure 2. Horizontal distribution of temperature at different depths around Lobito area in hot season. 21
Figure 3. Horizontal distribution of temperature at different depths around Lobito area in cold season. 22
Figure 4. Horizontal distribution of salinity at different depths around Lobito area in hot season. 23
Figure 5. Horizontal distribution of salinity at different depths around Lobito area in cold season. 24
Figure 6. Seasonal variations in vertical structure of temperature in... 25
Figure 7. Seasonal variations in the vertical structure of salinity in Lobito... 25
Figure 8. Relative proportion of zooplankton groups in Lobito during the study... 28
Figure 9. Seasonal changes of relative proportion of dominant zooplankton groups in... 29
Figure 10. Variation of total zooplankton abundance and number of species by... 33
Figure 11. Variation of total zooplankton abundance and number of species by... 34
Figure 12. Vertical distribution of zooplankton density in Lobito during study... 36
Figure 13. Seasonal variations of dominant zooplankton groups in Lobito during... 37
Figure 14. Dendrogram showing similarity of sampling stations based on the... 38
Figure 15. Vertical distribution of zooplankton abundance per station and depth... 39