Mdoka
m-DOH-kah (approx.)
The atlas records 30 collection-point forms from Mdoka, across 20 genera.
10.2834°S 34.1761°E
Mdoka is a lakeside village on Lake Malawi's northern Malawian shore, close to Mdoka Reef and roughly 4 km north-northwest of Chesese.
Where it is
Mdoka is on the western shore of Lake Malawi, in its northern third (56 mi south of the lake's northern tip).
Nearest collection points: Chesese 2.5 mi south · Vua 2.5 mi north-west · Mdowa 4.3 mi south-east
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) (~386 km) — Conductivity 235 µS/cm
Surface temperature here
Across May–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 (905 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
Site photographs show reed growth along the village shore, with the reef that gives the collection point its cichlid records lying just offshore.
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.