A comprehensive study on the community structure and function of the phytoplankton in Taipinghu Reservoir, the largest reservoir (9400 ha) in Anhui Province, China, was carried out during 1985-1986. A total of 175 species of algae belonging to 8 phyla and 87 genera was noted. The composition of phytoplankton was dominated by species of Chlorophyta, Cyanophyta and Bacillariophyta. The species number, cell density and biomass of the three groups were respectively 88%, 86.5% and 78.9% of the total phytoplankton. The weighted annual average biomass was 1.52 mg/L and cell density was 1.43 times 10-6 ind/L. The growth maximum was observed in summer. Diatoms were abundant in the region adjoining a river. A large number of flagellated algae such as Euglena and Chromulina occurred in the artificial fish culture bay. It can be inferred from the algal composition and total nitrogen concentration (1.48 mg/L) that this reservoir is a mesotrophic water body that had undergone slight natural eutrophication. Presented are an equation for the relation between cell density and biomass of algae and a newly developed method based on the energy flow principle in ecology for theoretically estimating algal fishery potential. The algae volumes of 128 species were measured for calculating the biomass.
