Ifala
ee-FAH-lah (approx.)
The atlas records 12 collection-point forms from Ifala, across 8 genera.
5.5175°S 29.8020°E
Ifala is a village on Tanzania's Lake Tanganyika shore, about 4 km south-east of Mkuyu.
Where it is
Ifala is on the eastern shore of Lake Tanganyika, in its central third (151 mi south of the lake's northern tip).
Nearest collection points: Mkuyu 2.6 mi north-west · Segunga Bay 3.6 mi south-east · Mkuyu Point 4 mi north-west
Shore, third and distances are measured from the coordinates above against the lake’s mapped outline.
The name
Ifala is the village’s name. The label “Hapa Ingii Fara” seen on older maps is a garbled rendering of the Swahili “Hapa ingia Ifala”, “here we enter Ifala”, apparently a misheard reply when a local resident was asked the name of the place. (Source: tanganyika.si)
The water
Lake-wide measured chemistry of Lake Tanganyika — collection points share their lake's water; site-specific figures are shown only where the literature records them.
Nearest measured station: Kigoma (central, east shore) (~73 km) — Temperature 25.7 °C · pH 8.9 · Conductivity 654 µS/cm · Visibility (Secchi) 12.8 m
Surface temperature here
Across May–Oct, monthly means run 78 °F to 80 °F — coolest in Aug. Measured by satellite 1995–2023: the daily median of clear readings within 10 km of the site (887 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.
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.