Aquarist Atlas
↑ Collection form of Xenotilapia tenuidentata

Xenotilapia tenuidentata "Katete"

Katete — kah-TEH-teh (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 tenuidentata account →

Specific to Katete

  • 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 tenuidentata.

IUCNLEAST CONCERN · 2025
CARESNOT LISTED
Scientific size3.1 in8 cm total length
Temperature75–82 °F24–28 °C
pH8.6–9.3alkaline
Depth0–66 ft0–20 m
DietZooplanktivore — picks individual copepods and other small crustaceans, plus diatoms and micro-organisms, from the open water column with a protrusible mouth.
BreedingBiparental mouthbrooder~6–15 eggs
Sexual dimorphismYesMinimal: females less than ~5% shorter than males and no color difference between sexes; males marginally larger with a longer innermost pelvic-fin ray.
PhotographsSee photosGoogle Images →

The Katete population

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

Colour reference: living Katete fish at tanganyika.si →

About the species

Xenotilapia tenuidentata is a tiny, slender, plankton-eating cichlid endemic to Lake Tanganyika, and one of the few members of the lake's sand-dwelling Ectodini that has largely abandoned the bottom for open water. Barely 3 in (8 cm) long, it gathers in dense, fast-moving schools of hundreds to thousands of fish that hang in the upper few meters and pick individual copepods out of the water with a protrusible mouth. It is also a biparental mouthbrooder, with both sexes sharing the rare and demanding job of carrying the brood — a strategy that has made it, and its sister species, a small puzzle in the story of how parental care evolved across the Tanganyikan cichlid flock.

Full Xenotilapia tenuidentata account →

Sources

  1. tanganyika.si — Xenotilapia tenuidentata "Katete"
  2. FishBase — Xenotilapia tenuidentata (Poll, 1951)
  3. Eschmeyer's Catalog of Fishes — tenuidentata, Xenotilapia (current status: Microdontochromis tenuidentatus)
  4. GBIF — Microdontochromis tenuidentatus (Poll, 1951)
  5. Cichlid Room Companion — Konings 2022, 'Tiny plankton-eaters from Lake Tanganyika: Microdontochromis, or are they Xenotilapia?' (Cichlid News 31(1):27-31, abstract)
  6. Sefc et al. 2012 — Repeated parallel evolution of parental care strategies within Xenotilapia (Ectodini), Lake Tanganyika (PMC)