Aquarist Atlas
↑ Collection form of Telmatochromis vittatus

Telmatochromis vittatus "Ngosa Point"Striped Telmatochromis

Telmatochromis vittatus (Chituta Bay, Congo, Isanga Bay, Kalugunga, Kasola Island, Kekese, Kerege Island, Kipili, Kisi Island, Kombe, Mbita Island, Mtosi Bay, Ngosa Point, Nkondwe Island, Tongwa, Ulwile Island)

Ngosa Point — n-GOH-sah POYNT (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 vittatus account →

Specific to Ngosa Point

  • 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 vittatus.

IUCNLEAST CONCERN · 2025
CARESNOT LISTED
Genus type speciesTelmatochromis temporalisBoulenger 1898
Scientific size4 in10 cm total length
Temperature75–79 °F24–26 °C
pH8.5–9alkaline
Habitat waterhard · 600–690 µS/cmLake Tanganyika
Depth16–66 ft5–20 m
DietAufwuchs grazer-omnivore; feeds on algae, diatoms, microorganisms and small invertebrates scraped from rocky surfaces
BreedingCave/substrate brooder; spawns in rock crevices, holes or empty snail shells~50 eggs
Sexual dimorphismYesMales grow larger and more slender than females
PhotographsSee photosGoogle Images →

The Ngosa Point population

Telmatochromis vittatus "Ngosa Point" is the Ngosa Point population of Telmatochromis vittatus, a geographic colour form from the Tanzania coast of Lake Tanganyika in the north-central part of the lake. It is the same species as Telmatochromis vittatus, distinguished by its collection locality and local coloration; aquarists keep and breed it as a discrete, provenance-labelled line.

Colour reference: living Ngosa Point fish at tanganyika.si →

About the species

Telmatochromis vittatus is a small, torpedo-shaped lamprologine cichlid endemic to Lake Tanganyika, where it grazes aufwuchs from rocky shores and tucks itself into crevices and empty snail shells. It is one of a cluster of look-alike striped Telmatochromis that hobbyists and even reference books routinely confuse. Its most curious wrinkle is ecological rather than visual: across the lake the species appears in a normal rock-dwelling form and a markedly smaller form that lives among shell beds, a split that mirrors a wider pattern of body-size divergence in the genus.

Full Telmatochromis vittatus account →

Sources

  1. tanganyika.si — Telmatochromis vittatus "Ngosa Point"
  2. FishBase: Telmatochromis vittatus (Boulenger, 1898)
  3. Catalog of Fishes (Cichlidae family details, listing T. vittatus as accepted/original)
  4. Morphological diversity of the genus Telmatochromis from Lake Tanganyika (recognizing the 'T. vittatus complex')
  5. Takahashi et al. (2009) — Evidence for divergent natural selection in body size of a Lake Tanganyika cichlid (T. temporalis), Molecular Ecology
  6. The taxonomic diversity of the cichlid fish fauna of ancient Lake Tanganyika (type locality: Mbity Rocks)
  7. IUCN Red List — Telmatochromis vittatus "Ngosa Point"
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