Aquarist Atlas
↑ Collection form of Xenotilapia boulengeri

Xenotilapia boulengeri "Kasanga"

Kasanga — kah-SAHN-gah (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 Xenotilapia boulengeri account →

Specific to Kasanga

  • 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 Xenotilapia boulengeri.

IUCNLEAST CONCERN · 2025
CARESNOT LISTED
Scientific size6 in15.3 cm total length
Temperature73–81 °F23–27 °C
pH8.6–9.3alkaline
Depth7–66 ft2–20 m
DietBenthic micro-carnivore: sifts sand for copepods, ostracods, gastropods, small shrimps and insect larvae (trophic level ~3.3)
BreedingMouthbrooder~50-60 eggs
Sexual dimorphismYesWeakly dimorphic: territorial males are larger, far more intensely colored, and carry longer dorsal/anal-fin extensions with darker anal and pelvic-fin edging; females are muted.
PhotographsSee photosGoogle Images →

The Kasanga population

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

Colour reference: living Kasanga fish at tanganyika.si →

About the species

Xenotilapia boulengeri is a sand-sifting cichlid endemic to Lake Tanganyika, the largest and most heavily built member of an otherwise delicate genus of Ectodine "sand cichlids." It earns its keep by combing the shallow sandy floor for tiny invertebrates, and it has a remarkable trick for staying alive while it does so: schools shelter beside the guarded nests of substrate-spawning cichlids, borrowing a parent's territoriality as a shield against scale-eating predators. How it broods its young, though, has been argued over for decades.

Full Xenotilapia boulengeri account →

Sources

  1. tanganyika.si — Xenotilapia boulengeri "Kasanga"
  2. Xenotilapia boulengeri — Catalog of Fishes (Eschmeyer, California Academy of Sciences)
  3. Xenotilapia boulengeri — FishBase species summary
  4. Xenotilapia Boulenger, 1899 — GBIF
  5. Takahashi & Nakaya (1997). A taxonomic review of Xenotilapia sima and X. boulengeri. Ichthyological Research 44.
  6. Ochi & Yanagisawa (1998). Commensalism between cichlid fishes through differential tolerance of guarding parents toward intruders. Journal of Fish Biology 52:985-996.