Protomelas sp. "Mbenji Thick-lip" "Mbenji Island"
Mbenji Island — m-BEHN-jee EYE-land (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 sp. "Mbenji Thick-lip" account →Specific to Mbenji Island
- 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 sp. "Mbenji Thick-lip".
The Mbenji Island population
Protomelas sp. "Mbenji Thick-lip" "Mbenji Island" is the Mbenji Island population of Protomelas sp. "Mbenji Thick-lip", a geographic colour form from the Malawi coast of Lake Malawi in the south-central part of the lake. It is the same species as Protomelas sp. "Mbenji Thick-lip", distinguished by its collection locality and local coloration; aquarists keep and breed it as a discrete, provenance-labelled line.
Colour reference: living Mbenji Island fish at malawi.si →
About the species
Protomelas sp. "Mbenji Thick-lip" is an undescribed haplochromine cichlid recorded from Mbenji Island, an offshore reef in the southern half of Lake Malawi that also carries a distinct, formally documented population of the described Protomelas spilonotus. This form is not that population: it is set apart in field and hobby references by noticeably thickened, fleshy lips, a trait it shares by convergence rather than close kinship with a handful of other Malawi cichlids that independently evolved the same feature. It has never been given a scientific name, and no authority, IUCN status, or FishBase entry should be attached to it.
Full Protomelas sp. "Mbenji Thick-lip" account →