Aquarist Atlas
↑ Collection form of Xenotilapia nasus

Xenotilapia nasus "Chituta Bay"

Chituta Bay — chee-TOO-tah BAY (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 nasus account →

Specific to Chituta Bay

  • 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 nasus.

IUCNDATA DEFICIENT · 2006
DDnot on the EX–LC scale
CARESNOT LISTED
Scientific size3.7 in9.3 cm total length
Temperature77–81 °F25–27 °C
pH8.6–9.2alkaline
Depth98–223 ft30–68 m
DietBenthic micro-forager: detritus and plankton sifted from sand-and-mud substrate; trophic level ~3.1.
BreedingBiparental mouthbrooder (genus-typical; unconfirmed for this species)~12–40 fry (genus-typical estimate; undocumented for X. nasus)
Sexual dimorphismYesNot documented for X. nasus specifically, but Xenotilapia typically show subtle sexual differences in size and breeding coloration; sexes are otherwise similar.
PhotographsSee photosGoogle Images →

The Chituta Bay population

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

Colour reference: living Chituta Bay fish at tanganyika.si →

About the species

Xenotilapia nasus is a small, sand-loving cichlid known only from the deeper sub-littoral floor of northern Lake Tanganyika, where it lives well below the reach of most snorkelers and aquarium collectors. Described as recently as 1995, it remains one of the lake's more obscure species: a sand-sifter named for its conspicuous, protruding snout that has been studied mostly from trawl and net samples rather than from life. For the hobbyist it is essentially a fish on paper, almost never exported, but it is a clean window into how Tanganyika's cichlid flock has colonised even the dim, deep margins of the lake.

Full Xenotilapia nasus account →

Sources

  1. tanganyika.si — Xenotilapia nasus "Chituta Bay"
  2. Xenotilapia nasus — FishBase species summary (ID 51597)
  3. Eschmeyer's Catalog of Fishes — Xenotilapia nasus (species record)
  4. Eschmeyer's Catalog of Fishes — Xenotilapia (genus record)
  5. GBIF — Xenotilapia nasus occurrence search
  6. De Vos, Risch & Thys van den Audenaerde (1995), original description — FishBase reference summary