Aquarist Atlas
↑ Collection form of Docimodus evelynae

Docimodus evelynae "Meponda"

Meponda — meh-POHN-dah (approx.)

The fish

How this cichlid is built, and everything about how it lives, eats and breeds, is shared with the species — this page doesn't repeat it.

Read the full Docimodus evelynae account →

Specific to Meponda

  • Collection locality & coordinates
  • Local coloration — best judged from the living-fish photo
  • Kept as a single-provenance line, never crossed with other collection points

Care facts below are the species' — shared with Docimodus evelynae.

CARESNOT LISTED
Scientific size8 in20 cm total length
Temperature75–82 °F24–28 °C
pH7.7–8.8alkaline
Hardness (GH)slightly hardup to 214 ppm
Depth0–131 ft0–40 m
DietLepidophage — feeds on the flank scales of other cichlids
BreedingMaternal mouthbrooderNot documented
Sexual dimorphismYesNot well catalogued because the species is rarely collected; breeding males are expected to intensify in colour as in most Malawi haplochromines.
PhotographsSee photosGoogle Images →

The Meponda population

Docimodus evelynae "Meponda" is the Meponda population of Docimodus evelynae, a geographic colour form from the Mozambique coast of Lake Malawi in the south-central part of the lake. It is the same species as Docimodus evelynae, distinguished by its collection locality and local coloration; aquarists keep and breed it as a discrete, provenance-labelled line.

Colour reference: living Meponda fish at malawi.si →

About the species

Docimodus evelynae is one of Lake Malawi's rarest and strangest cichlids: a scale-eating (lepidophagous) haplochromine that David Eccles and Digby Lewis added to the genus Docimodus in 1976, eighty years after Boulenger erected the genus for its heavy-jawed relative Docimodus johnstoni. Where D. johnstoni bites the fins off catfish, D. evelynae specialises on the flank scales of other cichlids — a division of labour between the lake's only two tissue-cropping haplochromine species. It is seldom seen even by researchers and essentially unknown in the aquarium trade.

Full Docimodus evelynae account →

Sources

  1. malawi.si — Docimodus evelynae "Meponda"
  2. Eschmeyer's Catalog of Fishes — search interface (authority for the valid name)
  3. FishBase — Docimodus evelynae species summary
  4. Eccles, D. H. & Lewis, D. S. C. 1976 — A revision of the genus Docimodus Boulenger (Pisces: Cichlidae), a group of fishes with unusual feeding habits from Lake Malawi (Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society)
  5. Konings, A. — Malawi Cichlids in their Natural Habitat (Cichlid Press)