Chitande Island
chee-TAHN-deh EYE-land (approx.)
The atlas records 34 collection-point forms from Chitande Island, across 18 genera.
10.3977°S 34.2573°E
Chitande Island is a small, rocky island on Lake Malawi's northern Malawian shore near Chilumba Bay, close to the Chitende Peninsula.
Where it is
Chitande Island is on the western shore of Lake Malawi, in its northern third (63 mi south of the lake's northern tip).
Nearest collection points: Chitende Cove 0.2 mi north-west · Bamba Rock 0.6 mi south · Matambukira Rocks 1.2 mi north-west
Shore, third and distances are measured from the coordinates above against the lake’s mapped outline.
The water
Lake-wide measured chemistry of Lake Malawi — collection points share their lake's water; site-specific figures are shown only where the literature records them.
Nearest measured station: Salima (south-east shore) (~373 km) — Conductivity 235 µS/cm
This site
Surface temperature here
Across May–Nov, monthly means run 76 °F to 81 °F — coolest in Aug. Measured by satellite 1995–2023: the daily median of clear readings within 10 km of the site (915 clear days). The rainy-season months are usually too cloudy to measure and are left blank.
Temperature: ESA Climate Change Initiative, Lakes_cci v3.0 (Asfour et al. 2026; doi:10.5285/a56dba09df8a42ec9fba8b8c7a5e1f69). Chemistry on this page remains the lake's own.
The site
Its rocky coast gives the site its mbuna community, and during the dry season a strip of land emerges that connects the island to the Malawi mainland.
Each entry below is the population of that species recorded here — the form aquarists keep and breed as a distinct, provenance-labelled line. Crossing forms from different collection points is considered hybridisation in the hobby.