Sexual dimorphismYesMales are more boldly patterned (deeper cross-hatch, blue-black darkening in breeding colour) and typically larger; females remain paler yellowish-white. Anal-fin egg-spots are more prominent in males.

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The Lumbaulo population

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

Colour reference: living Lumbaulo fish at malawi.si →

About the species

Labidochromis textilis is a small, forceps-mouthed mbuna of Lake Malawi's east-central coast, named for a body pattern so neatly cross-hatched it reminded its describer of woven cloth. Distributed along a comparatively long stretch of intermediate rocky habitat from Undu Reef in Tanzania south to Metangula in Mozambique, it forages on small invertebrates it picks from the crevices and leaf-litter pockets of shallow reefs — a dietary niche shared with a handful of congeners whose pointed snouts give them access where broader-mouthed cichlids cannot follow. Although quietly attractive and readily kept, it has never become a mainstream aquarium fish, and the trade knows it — when it appears at all — by the hobbyist alias 'Exasperatus.'

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Labidochromis textilis "Lumbaulo"

The Lumbaulo population

About the species

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