CONCLUSION

As ecology and biodiversity studies on mangrove ecosystems, rated among the most productive ecosystems of the world, are gaining momentum, there has been not yet any comprehensive inventory of mangrove molluscs, which are vital components of estuarine and other littoral ecosystem functioning. From the entire subcontinent of India, hitherto, not more than 100 species of mangrove associated molluscs were reported (Dey, 2006). Our compilation elevates this list substantially to over 200 species. It is as such difficult to isolate exclusive mangrove molluscs at our present level of efforts. As mangroves worldwide, and particularly along the densely populated Indian coast, are threatened with various anthropogenic pressures, from particularly developmental processes, nothing much is known about the fate of the high diversity of molluscs associated with these swamps. Being vital links in estuarine and coastal nutrient cycles and themselves constituting food for scores of faunal species in higher trophic levels, including of the humans, the mangrove molluscs require much more attention from conservation biologists. This is all the more important since their silent local extinctions from increasingly human impacted estuaries might set off cascading effects with far reaching consequences affecting the food security of both humans and various other species in water and land, particularly of fishes and birds.