Aquarist Atlas
↑ Collection form of Protomelas kirkii

Protomelas kirkii "Chembe Beach"

Chembe Beach — CHEHM-beh BEECH (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 Protomelas kirkii account →

Specific to Chembe Beach

  • 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 Protomelas kirkii.

IUCNLEAST CONCERN · 2018
CARESNOT LISTED
Scientific size7.1 in18 cm total length
Temperature75–82 °F24–28 °C
pH7.7–8.8alkaline
Depth3–16 ft1–5 m
DietSifts biocover & invertebrates
BreedingMaternal mouthbrooderA few dozen eggs (genus-typical; not separately documented)
Sexual dimorphismYesBreeding males blue-green with red-flecked scales and anal egg-spots; females and non-territorial males muted silver-brown with a broken lateral band and smaller in size
PhotographsSee photosGoogle Images →

The Chembe Beach population

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

Colour reference: living Chembe Beach fish at malawi.si →

About the species

Protomelas kirkii is a maternal mouthbrooding cichlid endemic to the Lake Malawi system, a fish of sun-warmed sandy bays where stands of the eelgrass Vallisneria break the open shallows. Drab and silver as a female, the male turns blue-green with red-flecked scales when he claims a patch of sand, but the species' real signature is in its mouth: a set of enlarged pharyngeal teeth built for crushing the small snails it hunts in the weed. It is one of the so-called Kambuzi cichlids, a cluster of close Protomelas look-alikes that test the patience of anyone trying to tell them apart.

Full Protomelas kirkii account →

Sources

  1. malawi.si — Protomelas kirkii "Chembe Beach"
  2. Eschmeyer's Catalog of Fishes — Protomelas kirkii (Günther 1894)
  3. FishBase — Protomelas kirkii (Günther, 1894)
  4. GBIF — Protomelas kirkii occurrence and taxonomy
  5. Günther, A. (1894). Second report on the reptiles, batrachians, and fishes transmitted by Mr. H. H. Johnston from British Central Africa. Proc. Zool. Soc. London (original description as Chromis kirkii)
  6. Konings, A. (2016). Malawi Cichlids in their Natural Habitat (5th ed.) — Protomelas / Kambuzi group, sand-and-vegetation haplochromines