Chetia
| Chetia | ||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Chetia welwitschi |
||||||||||||
| Systematics | ||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||
| Scientific name | ||||||||||||
| Chetia | ||||||||||||
| Trewavas , 1961 |
Chetia is a genus from the family of cichlids (Cichlidae), which is distributed with six species in southern Africa from Angola ( Caluango , Cutato and Kunene ) via Zambia ( Luongo ) to Mozambique ( Komati , Lecitu (river basin of the Búzi ) and Limpopo ) .
features
Chetia species become 12 to 20 cm long. Males are significantly larger than the females and show a more conspicuous color. The body is of the typical cichlid shape and somewhat flattened on the sides. It is mainly covered by round scales, there are only a few comb scales or they are only incompletely formed. The head is big and beefy. The relatively numerous egg spots on the anal fin of the males have neither a light nor a dark border. The genus differs from other haplochromine cichlids of southern Africa mainly in the number of vertebrae, which in Chetia is 30 to 32 (35 to 41 in Sargochromis and 28 to 34 in Serranochromis ). The teeth in the jaws are one or two pointed. The scaling on the "cheeks" is strong.
Way of life
Almost nothing is known about the way of life of the Chetia species. The Chetia species in which the brood business is known are ovophilic mouthbrooders in which the female takes care of the mouthbrood.
species
Today six species belong to the genus Chetia :
- Chetia brevicauda Bills & Olaf, 2002
- Chetia brevis Jubb, 1968
- Chetia flaviventris Trewavas, 1961 ( type species )
- Chetia gracilis (Greenwood, 1984)
- Chetia mola Balon & Stewart, 1983
- Chetia welwitschi ( Boulenger , 1898)
literature
- Anton Lamboj: The cichlids of western Africa. Publisher: Natur und Tier, 2006, ISBN 386-659000-8
Web links
- Chetia on Fishbase.org (English)