Aquarist Atlas
↑ Collection form of Tramitichromis sp. "Red Gular"

Tramitichromis sp. "Red Gular" "Songwe Hill"

Songwe Hill — SOHN-gweh HIL (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 Tramitichromis sp. "Red Gular" account →

Specific to Songwe Hill

  • 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 Tramitichromis sp. "Red Gular".

CARESNOT LISTED
Scientific size6.5 in16 cm total length
Temperature75–82 °F24–28 °C
pH7.7–8.6alkaline
Hardness (GH)very hardup to 446 ppm
Depth7–49 ft2–15 m
DietSand-sifting invertivore, filtering insect larvae and soft invertebrates from sediment through the gill rakers
Breedingmaternal mouthbroodernot documented for this form; expected modest, a few dozen eggs, by analogy with similarly sized Tramitichromis
Sexual dimorphismYesMales develop a red patch on the throat (gular region); females and non-breeding males are expected to be cryptically plain, lacking the marking.
PhotographsSee photosGoogle Images →

The Songwe Hill population

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

Colour reference: living Songwe Hill fish at malawi.si →

About the species

Tramitichromis sp. "Red Gular" is an undescribed sand-dwelling haplochromine recorded from Songwe Hill in the far south of Lake Malawi, close to the South West Arm that has produced most described Tramitichromis material. The trade name refers to a red patch on the throat — the gular region — of breeding males, a colour feature used to tell it apart from plainer congeners in the field. It is a sand-sifting invertivore sharing the genus's distinctively angled pharyngeal jaw, and it has never been formally described, so it carries no authority, no publication year, no FishBase entry, and no IUCN assessment.

Full Tramitichromis sp. "Red Gular" account →

Sources

  1. malawi.si — Tramitichromis sp. "Red Gular" "Songwe Hill"
  2. malawi.si — Konings-based Lake Malawi cichlid species and locality database (Tramitichromis)
  3. Cichlid Room Companion — Malawi cichlid genus and undescribed-form references (Ad Konings, curator)
  4. Konings, A. — Malawi Cichlids in their Natural Habitat (Cichlid Press; foremost Malawi field authority)