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Impacts of climate variability and resulting changes in aquatic ecosystems have caused a rapid shift in the spatial distribution of species. This shift forces diversification in livelihood options among the fishers. Many resources are emerging as new fishery which could be the indicator of changes in the food web and ecosystems as a whole due to climatic variability coupled with changes in exploitation patterns. One of the emerging non-conventional fishery resources is the pufferfish which is exploited along the Karnataka coast, south-eastern Arabian Sea. A decrease in mean trophic level due to the increased fishing effort or climatic variability resulted in the removal of top-level predators leading to the rise of mid-level carnivores like Lagocephalus inermis in the Arabian Sea. A substantial increase has been noticed in the landing of pufferfish in trawl along with Karnataka since 2007 and has resulted in diversification of the employment in the fisheries sector. The pufferfish brought to the shore by trawlers are degutted, de-skinned, and cut into small pieces, and packed for transportation to other parts of the country. This sector has provided employment to about fifty women in each landing center, and each of them earns INR 200-300/day. The matured eggs collected from the fish are sold at a price of INR 10/kg. In addition, the trade of salted and dried fishes generated employment to an additional 50 women in the sector. This diversification has given more employment opportunities, especially to women. The study conducted revealed an increase of 1.5 fold from landing to the final product. Diversification of the livelihood to cope up with the changes in the fishery is an adaptation measure to combat species shift associated with climate change and climatic variability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The limits recommended by World Health Organization (WHO) and the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board (AERB) of India for uranium concentration in drinking water are 30 µg/l and 60 µg/l respectively. The present study on uranium concentration in groundwater used for drinking purposes in 73 villages of Karnataka, India, shows that in 57 villages uranium concentration is more than 30 µg/l, including 48 villages where it exceeds 60 µg/l. Thus in 78% and 66% of the villages studied, uranium concentration exceeds permissible limits given by WHO and AERB respectively. It is alarming to note that in one village each in Tumkur and Chitradurga districts, five in Kolar and seven in Chikkaballapura districts, uranium concentration is in thousands of micrograms per litre. None of the borewells from which water has been sampled is anywhere in the vicinity of nuclear facilities or urban waste disposal channels. Thus, the observed uranium contamination is considered to be geogenic. Previous geological studies have shown that the eastern portion of Karnataka is a part of the Neoarchean Eastern Dharwar Craton dominated by large ion lithophile element-rich K-feldspar granites and gneisses with higher abundance of radioactive elements (uranium and thorium) compared to the Mesoarchean tonalite-trondhjemite-gneisses and granitoids widely distributed in the Western Dharwar Craton. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]