INITIAL STUDY ON BACTERIAL COUNT FOR TWO BEACHES IN PENINSULAR MALAYSIA

Abstract

Studies on marine bacteria have revealed that, microbes essentially influence the ocean profciency to sustain life on earth. However, in order to meet the demands of the tourism sector, rapid development has been done in the coastal area. As a result, many natural habitats and marine life being affected including marine bacteria which are also a key factor in ensuring the stability of the marine ecosystem. Thus, this study was conducted to examine how marine bacteria were affected by coastal development in Peninsular Malaysia by comparing the bacterial counts between developed and undeveloped beach. At the same time, considering the effects of coastal development on marine ecosystem. Triplicates water samples at several sampling points were collected from Teluk Kemang Beach, Negeri Sembilan (developed) and Pandak Beach, Terengganu (undeveloped) for analysis. By using the Plate Count Agar (PCA), total count method was adopted to determine the bacterial counts. Physico-chemical such as dissolve oxygen (DO), pH, temperature, salinity and nutrients concentration was evaluated to assess their relationship with the bacterial counts. It was found that, bacterial count at Teluk Kemang was recorded lower than that of Pandak beach with 1.13 ± 0.48 x 108 CFU/ml and 2.55 ± 0.49 x 108 CFU/ml respectively. This is due to poor water quality at developed beach such as Teluk Kemang compared to Pandak beach. Since bacterial counts were signifcantly correlated with water qualities mainly DO and ammonium in this study (correlation coeffcient, r > 0.5), thus it can be concluded that, bacterial counts at developed beaches were negatively affected due to disturbed seawater quality.