Aquarist Atlas
↑ Collection form of Mylochromis ericotaenia

Mylochromis ericotaenia "Nkhata Bay"

Nkhata Bay — n-KAH-tah BAY (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 ericotaenia account →

Specific to Nkhata Bay

  • 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 ericotaenia.

IUCNLEAST CONCERN · 2018
CARESNOT LISTED
Scientific size8.1 in20.6 cm total length
Temperature75–82 °F24–28 °C
pH7.7–8.6alkaline
Depth—not recorded
DietBenthic sand-sifting invertivore; feeds on invertebrates and probably phytoplankton (FishBase)
BreedingMaternal (ovophilous) mouthbrooder; polygynous, no pair bondnot published for this species; a few dozen eggs inferred from similarly-sized congeners (FLAGGED as undocumented)
Sexual dimorphismYesGenus-typical: breeding males develop bright nuptial coloration (blue-grey with metallic highlights); females and non-breeding males are cryptic tan-grey with the broken lateral band. Species-specific dimorphism not separately documented.
PhotographsSee photosGoogle Images →

The Nkhata Bay population

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

Colour reference: living Nkhata Bay fish at malawi.si →

About the species

Mylochromis ericotaenia is a sand-dwelling haplochromine cichlid endemic to Lake Malawi, recorded from the far northern and southern ends of the lake. Described by C. Tate Regan in 1922 from the lake's open sandy floor, it belongs to the long-snouted Mylochromis lineage that probes loose sediment for buried invertebrates. Its name records its single most distinctive feature: a dark flank band that is broken up into a chain of separate blotches running from the nape to the base of the tail, rather than the solid diagonal stripe of its better-known relatives.

Full Mylochromis ericotaenia account →

Sources

  1. malawi.si — Mylochromis ericotaenia "Nkhata Bay"
  2. FishBase — Mylochromis ericotaenia (Regan, 1922)
  3. Eschmeyer's Catalog of Fishes — Mylochromis ericotaenia species record (spid 37776; valid; orig. Haplochromis ericotaenia)
  4. The ETYFish Project — Cichlidae part 4: Mylochromis and M. ericotaenia etymology
  5. Regan, C.T. (1922) — The cichlid fishes of Lake Nyassa. Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London (original description of Haplochromis ericotaenia)
  6. Derijst, E. & Snoeks, J. (1992) — Maravichromis Eccles and Trewavas, 1989, a junior synonym of Mylochromis Regan, 1920. Cybium 16(2): 173