Language: English
Mahatma Gandhi Marine National Park is one of nine National Parks on the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. It is unique in its biodiversity due to the presence of various ecosystems like sandy, rocky, muddy, coral reef and mangroves. Faunal studies on the marine park are scanty and documentation of various faunal groups is poor. Here, an attempt has been made by the authors to survey and document the marine fish and entomofauna of the terrestrial ecosystem for a better understanding of these two faunal groups to help with proper management of the marine National park. Owing to restrictions on the collection of specimens from the National Park area, very few faunal representatives have been collected and studied on a qualitative basis. The present work is also based on the field observations and underwater photography, The material collected and studied has been deposited with the reference collections of the Zoological Survey of lndia. Port Blair. A large number of fish species, which have not been reported earlier from the marine park islands, have been discovered by SCUBA diving during the studies.