Sarconema filiforme (Sonder) Kylin, 1932

Ganesan, Review Meenakshisundaram, Trivedi, Nitin, Gupta, Vishal, Madhav, S. Venu, Reddy, Chennur Radhakrishna & Levine, Ira A., 2019, Seaweed resources in India - current status of diversity and cultivation: prospects and challenges, Botanica Marina (Warsaw, Poland) 62 (5), pp. 463-482 : 470-471

Sarconema filiforme

Sarconema filiforme (Sonder) Kylin is a carrageenophyte containing hybrids of α- carrageenan, iota-carrageenan and pyruvated α- carrageenan ( Ganesan et al. 2015a). Currently, industrial utilization of hybrid carrageenans, especially in the food and cosmetic industries, is significantly increasing. Indian waters have two species of Sarconema viz. S. scinaioides and S. filiforme ; of these two species, S. scinaioides inhabits the intertidal region of India’s north west coast ( Jha et al. 2009), while S. filiforme is sparsely distributed along the southeast and northwest coasts ( Oza and Zaidi 2001). Pilot-scale cultivation of S. filiforme was completed along the Mandapam coast, utilizing the bamboo raft method. Young and actively growing S. filiforme (average 0.8 ± 0.25 g fresh wt) were attached to the ropes at 5-cm intervals. Attached to each rope were 25 algal cuttings totaling 20 g. fresh wt rope−1. Each raft, with 20 ropes, totaled 400 g fresh wt equivalent to 160 g fresh wt m−2 ( Ganesan et al. 2015a).

Sarconema reached harvestable size in 25 days and all plants were completely harvested and ropes were freshly stocked with new cuttings after every harvest ( Figure 10 ). 100 rafts were planted with S. filiforme and seven harvests were completed each year for 3 consecutive years from 2011 to 2013. An average of 2.3 kg fresh wt m−2 was harvested from the initial inocula of 160 g fresh wt m−2. An average of 150 fresh tonnes ha−1 year−1 of S. filiforme could be obtained utilizing this method ( Ganesan et al. 2015a).

Figures

Figure 10: Sarconema filiforme cultivation. (A) Seeded lines with fish net; (B) S. filiforme ready for harvest.