Aquarist Atlas
↑ Collection form of Xenotilapia ochrogenys

Xenotilapia ochrogenys "Karilani Island"

Karilani Island — kah-ree-LAH-nee EYE-land (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 ochrogenys account →

Specific to Karilani Island

  • 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 ochrogenys.

IUCNLEAST CONCERN · 2025
CARESNOT LISTED
Scientific size4.3 in11 cm total length
Temperature75–81 °F24–27 °C
pH8.6–9.3alkaline
Depth0–164 ft0–50 m
DietCarnivore — sand-sifter taking buried micro-invertebrates (chironomid larvae, aquatic worms, ostracods, copepods)
BreedingMaternal mouthbrooder (within a promiscuous, polygynandrous mating system)~10–40 eggs
Sexual dimorphismYesBreeding males flush with a yellow-ochre cheek and brighter fins/body sheen; non-breeding males and females are camouflage silvery-sand. Dichromatism typical of a polygynous fish; X. singularis males (sibling species) additionally show 3–5 black flank blotches that ochrogenys lacks
PhotographsSee photosGoogle Images →

The Karilani Island population

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

Colour reference: living Karilani Island fish at tanganyika.si →

About the species

Xenotilapia ochrogenys is a small, silver, sand-dwelling cichlid of Lake Tanganyika that lives much of its life as part of a roving school over the shallow lakebed, sifting mouthfuls of sand for buried invertebrates. For a few frantic weeks each breeding season the school's drab males flush into color, stake out spawning grounds, and engage in a promiscuous free-for-all in which a single female's eggs may be fertilized by two or three different males before she takes the clutch into her mouth to brood. That maternal mouthbrooding is itself notable: the genus Xenotilapia is one of the very few cichlid lineages in which biparental and female-only brood care sit side by side on the family tree, and ochrogenys falls cleanly on the maternal side of that divide.

Full Xenotilapia ochrogenys account →

Sources

  1. tanganyika.si — Xenotilapia ochrogenys "Karilani Island"
  2. Eschmeyer's Catalog of Fishes — ochrogenys, Enantiopus (Boulenger 1914), valid as Xenotilapia ochrogenys
  3. FishBase — Xenotilapia ochrogenys (Boulenger, 1914)
  4. FishBase — Reproduction summary, Xenotilapia ochrogenys
  5. GBIF — Xenotilapia ochrogenys (Boulenger, 1914), accepted taxon (speciesKey 2369825)
  6. Kidd, Duftner, Koblmüller, Sturmbauer & Hofmann 2012 — Repeated Parallel Evolution of Parental Care Strategies within Xenotilapia (PLoS ONE 7(2):e31236)