Maingano Island
mah-een-GAH-noh EYE-land (approx.)
The atlas records 25 collection-point forms from Maingano Island, across 14 genera.
12.0478°S 34.7598°E
Maingano Island is a small rocky islet in Lake Malawi close to Likoma Island, about 1 km east-southeast of Mbako (Mainya) Bay.
Where it is
Maingano Island is in open water about 4.3 mi off the eastern shore, in the central third of Lake Malawi (178 mi south of the lake's northern tip).
Nearest collection points: Mbako Bay 0.7 mi north-west · Membe Point 0.9 mi south-west · Madimba Bay 1 mi south-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) (~193 km) — Conductivity 235 µS/cm
This site
Surface temperature here
Across Apr–Nov, monthly means run 76 °F to 82 °F — coolest in Aug. Measured by satellite 1995–2023: the daily median of clear readings within 10 km of the site (1256 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
The islet's name has become a standard hobby label for a small mbuna population collected here, kept and bred as its own line like the other Likoma-area provenances.
Sources
- malawi.si — Maingano Island, Lake Malawi, Malawi: location page
- Konings, A. (2016). Malawi Cichlids in their Natural Habitat, 5th Edition. Cichlid Press, El Paso.
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.