FIRST RECORD OF NON NATIVE LORICARIID CATFISH PTERYGOPLICHTHYS DISJUNCTIVUS WEBER 1991 SILURIFORMES LORICARIIDAE IN CAUVERY RIVER OF PENINSULAR INDIA
Cauvery is a major inter state river of peninsular India and flows through the states of Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. The river, with its origin at Talakaveri in the Western Ghats of Karnataka State, India, has a length of 765 km and covers a drainage area of nearly 87,000 km2 (Varunprasanth and Nicholas, 2010) The river can be divided into two zones within Karnataka viz. Mountainousfrom origin (1341 m) up to Kushalnagar (830 m asl) and Plateaufrom Kushalnagar up to Mekedatu. The upper stretch of Cauvery river harbours a good fishery of indigenous carps. Among them, Gonoproktopterus dubius, Labeo kontius and Puntius carnaticus are indigenous to river Cauvery and Cirrhinus reba, Labeo calbasu, Tor khudree, Osteocheilus thomassi, Schismatorhyncus nukta and Systomus sarana, among others are native to river Cauvery. The exotic carps include Cyprinus carpio, Oreochromis mossambicus, O. niloticus and C. garipienus.