Aquarist Atlas
↑ Collection form of Tropheops sp. "Boadzulu"

Tropheops sp. "Boadzulu" "Makokola Reef"

Tropheops sp. "Boadzulu" (Boadzulu Island, Makokola Reef)

Makokola Reef — mah-koh-KOH-lah REEF (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 Tropheops sp. "Boadzulu" account →

Specific to Makokola Reef

  • 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 Tropheops sp. "Boadzulu".

CARESNOT LISTED
Genus type speciesTropheops tropheopsdescribed as Pseudotropheus tropheops Regan 1922
Scientific size4.5 in11 cm total length
Temperature75–82 °F24–28 °C
pH7.7–8.6alkaline
Hardness (GH)up to 446 ppm
Habitat watermoderately soft, alkaline, well-buffered79 ppmLake Malawi
Depth3–49 ft1–15 m
DietAlgae grazer (aufwuchs), rasping the algal mat from rock surfaces at a steep, head-down angle characteristic of the genus
Breedingmaternal mouthbroodernot documented for this form; genus-typical, on the order of a few dozen eggs
Sexual dimorphismYesSexual dichromatism presumed typical for the genus; no specific colour account documented for this population.
PhotographsSee photosGoogle Images →

The Makokola Reef population

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

Colour reference: living Makokola Reef fish at malawi.si →

About the species

Tropheops sp. "Boadzulu" is an undescribed rock-dwelling mbuna documented at Boadzulu Island and neighbouring Makokola Reef, near the southeastern end of Lake Malawi. Boadzulu is one of the lake's better-studied reefs, host to dozens of named locality forms across several genera, and this Tropheops is one more piece of that mosaic — a population distinguished, like most Tropheops "sp." forms, essentially by where it was collected. It has never been given a formal scientific description, and no authority, IUCN status, or FishBase entry should be attached to it.

Full Tropheops sp. "Boadzulu" account →

Sources

  1. malawi.si — Tropheops sp. "Boadzulu" "Makokola Reef"
  2. Cichlid Room Companion — genus Tropheops
  3. Konings, A. — Malawi Cichlids in their Natural Habitat (Cichlid Press)
  4. Eschmeyer's Catalog of Fishes (Fricke, Eschmeyer & Van der Laan, eds., CAS) — searched: no valid name for the undescribed "Boadzulu" form
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