Perissodus paradoxus "Halembe"
Perissodus paradoxus (Chituta Bay, Halembe, Isanga Bay, Kigoma)
Halembe — hah-LEHM-beh (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 Perissodus paradoxus account →Specific to Halembe
- 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 Perissodus paradoxus.
The Halembe population
Perissodus paradoxus "Halembe" is the Halembe population of Perissodus paradoxus, a geographic colour form from the Tanzania coast of Lake Tanganyika in the northern part of the lake. It is the same species as Perissodus paradoxus, distinguished by its collection locality and local coloration; aquarists keep and breed it as a discrete, provenance-labelled line.
Colour reference: living Halembe fish at tanganyika.si →
About the species
Perissodus paradoxus is a scale-eating cichlid endemic to Lake Tanganyika, one of a small guild of fishes that make a living by tearing scales and skin off the living flanks of larger cichlids. It is probably the most commonly encountered scale-eater in the lake, a slender, silvery hunter that drifts a meter above the sand in loose groups before darting in to rob its prey. Its name is in flux — described in 1898 as Plecodus paradoxus, it is now treated by most ichthyologists as Perissodus paradoxus — but its strange ecology, not its label, is what has made the genus a touchstone in evolutionary biology.
Full Perissodus paradoxus account →Sources
- tanganyika.si — Perissodus paradoxus "Halembe"
- Eschmeyer's Catalog of Fishes — Plecodus paradoxus (species record, Boulenger 1898; holotype MRAC 189; current status Perissodus paradoxus)
- FishBase — Perissodus paradoxus (max size, depth, distribution, trophic level, etymology, IUCN line)
- GBIF — Perissodus paradoxus / Plecodus paradoxus (Boulenger, 1898): taxonomy, synonymy & occurrences
- Koblmüller, Egger, Sturmbauer & Sefc (2007), 'Evolutionary history of Lake Tanganyika's scale-eating cichlid fishes', Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 44:1295-1305
- Takahashi, Watanabe, Nishida & Hori (2007), 'Evolution of feeding specialization in Tanganyikan scale-eating cichlids: a molecular phylogenetic approach', BMC Evolutionary Biology (Perissodus diet composition incl. P. paradoxus)
- IUCN Red List — Perissodus paradoxus "Halembe"