Morphometric and Meristic Variation of Endangered Pabda Catfish, Ompok pabda from Southern Coastal Waters of Bangladesh

The present study was aimed to determine the variation in diversity of Ompok pabda based on morphometric and meristic analyses of samples collected from four southern coastal rivers of Bangladesh. A total of 80 individuals ranging from 9.50-13.50 cm in total length (TL) and 4.44-14.83 g in body weight (BW) were compared for morphometric and meristic analysis to explore their taxonomic relationship. Eighteen morphometric characters out of 25 showed significant variation (p < 0.05) while 3 meristic characters out of 5 differ significantly. In case of morphometric measurements, the 1st, 2nd and 3rd discriminant function (DF) accounted for 64.4%, 19.5% and 16.1%, respectively of among group variability explaining 100% of the total among-group variability.The dendrogram based on morphometric data revealed that the Baleswer and Payra river population showed high degree of overlapping whereas Halda river population was more diversified with all population. The canonical graph also showed all population of Halda river was highly intermediate with the Baleswer and Payra river population compare to Tentulia River in isometric condition. The present findings may provide useful information for the conservation and sustainable management of this important fish.