Aquarist Atlas
↑ Collection form of Mylochromis balteatus

Mylochromis balteatus "Mvunguti"

Mvunguti — m-voon-GOO-tee (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 Mylochromis balteatus account →

Specific to Mvunguti

  • 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 Mylochromis balteatus.

IUCNNOT EVALUATED
NEnot on the EX–LC scale
CARESNOT LISTED
Scientific size6.4 in16.2 cm total length
Temperature75–82 °F24–28 °C
pH7.7–8.6alkaline
Depth—not recorded
DietBenthic invertivore — generalist sand-sifter taking small invertebrates (not a molluscivore; pharyngeal teeth non-molariform)
BreedingMaternal (ovophilous) mouthbrooder; polygynous, no pair bondNot published for this species; likely a few dozen eggs for a ~16 cm fish (inferred from similarly sized congeners — not a measured datum)
Sexual dimorphismYesGenus-typical: breeding males develop brighter bluish nuptial coloration and defend nests; females and non-breeding fish are cryptic silvery-beige with the oblique band prominent. Not documented in fine detail for balteatus.
PhotographsSee photosGoogle Images →

The Mvunguti population

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

Colour reference: living Mvunguti fish at malawi.si →

About the species

Mylochromis balteatus is a small, sand-dwelling haplochromine cichlid endemic to Lake Malawi, named for the bold dark band that runs obliquely across its flank like a sword-belt. One of the many oblique-striped Mylochromis of the lake's open sandy floor, it was described by Ethelwynn Trewavas in her landmark 1935 synopsis of the Lake Nyasa cichlids and is known chiefly from the lake's northern reaches around Vua and Karonga. It reaches only about 16 cm and is a generalist invertebrate forager rather than one of the genus's hard-shell-crushing specialists.

Full Mylochromis balteatus account →

Sources

  1. malawi.si — Mylochromis balteatus "Mvunguti"
  2. FishBase — Mylochromis balteatus (Trewavas, 1935); SpecCode 2225
  3. Eschmeyer's Catalog of Fishes — balteatus (Trewavas, 1935); lectotype BMNH 1935.6.14.2357, type locality Vua
  4. GBIF — Mylochromis balteatus (Trewavas, 1935)
  5. Trewavas, E. (1935) — A synopsis of the cichlid fishes of Lake Nyasa. Annals and Magazine of Natural History (10) 16(91): 65–118 [original description, as Haplochromis balteatus]
  6. Eccles, D.H. & Trewavas, E. (1989) — Malawian Cichlid Fishes: the classification of some haplochromine genera