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(1952 & 1953); Umamaheshwara Rao & Sreeramulu (1964 & 1970); Subba Rao et al.,

(1983); Rao & et al., (2008); Satya Rao et al., (2011); Srinivasa Rao (2012); Subba Rangaiah
& et al., (2012); Satya Rao et al., (2011); Kaliaperumal & Chennubhotla (2015); Sowjanya &

Sekhar (2015) were inspected the seaweeds of Andhra Pradesh and their potential
perspectives on the various spectrum of science in different decades. They merely surveyed

the Visakhapatnam, the midst coastline of Andhra Pradesh. Information on seaweeds from
the northern (Srikakulam & Vizianagaram) of Andhra Pradesh are sporadic, rare, inadequate

and inattentive too. The perusal of the literature survey also makes clear that the exertion on

seaweeds diversity of Andhra Pradesh coast is very meagre. In view of the above facts, this
present study is subjected to provide a detailed account of the marine macroalgal flora of

Northern coastal districts of Andhra Pradesh, India Andhra Pradesh.

MATERIALS & METHOD
Andhra Pradesh is geographically positioned between 12°41' - 19° 07'N latitude and

69°37' - 84°44'E longitude. Among the other coastal states, Andhra Pradesh has got a
coastline of around c.973 km, running from Pulicat Lake (Nellore district) in the south to

Donkuru (Srikakulam District) in the North. The study area will be divided into three major
zones i.e., South (Nellore, Guntur, and Prakasam), middle (Krishna, West Godavari, and East

Godavari), and north (Visakhapatnam, Srikakulam, and Vizianagaram). The offshore rocky

plateaus stretch from Srikakulam district to Visakhapatnam district with an enormous
diversity of seaweeds and the remaining coastline is endowed with sand beach. Vizianagaram

and Srikakulam are the northern coastal districts of Andhra Pradesh and located at the
coordinates of 17 ° 58’ 07.39” to 19 ° 03’06.20” N & 083 ° 32’ 49.12” to 084 ° 45’ 19.80” E.

The boundaries of the northern districts limited by Odisha in the northwest, Visakhapatnam
in the south, Bay of Bengal in the East. The length of the coastline is 222 km (Vizianagaram -

c. 28Km & Srikakulam – c. 194Km). Nagavali, Vegavathi, Gomukhi, Suvarnamukhi,

Champavathi and Gostani are the major rivers flowing in Viziangaram District. Similarly, the
rivers Nagavali, Vamsadhara, Mahendratanaya, Champavati, Bahuda, Kumbhikota Gedda,

Suvarnamukhi, Vegavati, Gomukhi are stretched in Srikakulam District. The appropriate

atmospheric temperature varies from 280 C - 360C and water temperature diverges from 250
C - 290 C. During our collection we recorded the average tide level of 0.8-1.2m. The habit of

the coast is sandy along with eroded coarse boulders, calcareous rocks, mosaic Rocks,
granites and rocky beds (Fig. -I & Plate – 1).

A sum of 22 localities was sited and surveyed for the collection of marine macroalgae
during low tides in different seasons from March 2017 – August 2019. The seaweed samples

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