Telmatochromis brachygnathus "Cape Chaitika"
Cape Chaitika — KAYP chah-ee-TEE-kah (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 Telmatochromis brachygnathus account →Specific to Cape Chaitika
- 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 Telmatochromis brachygnathus.
The Cape Chaitika population
Telmatochromis brachygnathus "Cape Chaitika" is the Cape Chaitika population of Telmatochromis brachygnathus, a geographic colour form from the Zambia coast of Lake Tanganyika in the southern part of the lake. It is the same species as Telmatochromis brachygnathus, distinguished by its collection locality and local coloration; aquarists keep and breed it as a discrete, provenance-labelled line.
Colour reference: living Cape Chaitika fish at tanganyika.si →
About the species
Telmatochromis brachygnathus is a small, drab, rock-dwelling cichlid endemic to the southern and central reaches of Lake Tanganyika, described only in 2003 after decades of hiding in plain sight inside the widespread Telmatochromis temporalis. Its scientific name literally means "short jaw," a nod to the slightly smaller mouth that, together with a deeper body, is its main calling card. An algae-grazer that occasionally raids the egg clutches of the lake's killifish, it is a biparental cave brooder rather than a mouthbrooder. It is rarely exported and barely known in the hobby, which makes it a useful reminder of how much of Tanganyika's fish diversity remains quietly cryptic.
Full Telmatochromis brachygnathus account →Sources
- tanganyika.si — Telmatochromis brachygnathus "Cape Chaitika"
- Hanssens & Snoeks 2003 — A new species and geographical variation in the Telmatochromis temporalis complex (J. Fish Biol. 63:593–616)
- FishBase — Telmatochromis brachygnathus
- Eschmeyer's Catalog of Fishes (CAS) — Telmatochromis
- GBIF / EOL occurrence map — Telmatochromis brachygnathus
- Indermaur, Schedel & Ronco 2024 — Morphological diversity of the genus Telmatochromis (J. Fish Biol.)