Maylandia mbenjii
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| ( Stauffer , Bowers, Kellogg & McKaye, 1997) |
Maylandia mbenjii ( Syn .: Metriaclima mbenjii ) is a species of cichlid that occurs endemically in the rock littoral to the Mbenji Islands in the Malawian section of the East African Lake Malawi .
features
Maylandia mbenjii becomes 11 cm long and has a typical mbuna-Shape. Most sexually mature males are metallic light blue with six to eight transverse ligaments and a white belly. Above the eyes the head is light blue with two blue-gray bands between the eyes, below it is blue-gray. There is a green spot on the gill covers. The throat is white. The dorsal fin is orange to reddish with white-blue fin membrane tips. In the caudal fin, the fin rays are blue, the fin membranes are orange. The anal rays are blue. Their fin membranes are orange towards the trunk, transparent in the middle and blue on the edge. There are three to eight yellow egg spots on the posterior anal fin. The pelvic fins are light blue, the front fin ray is intensely colored, the rest of the fin is more transparent. Females are dark brown with 6 to 8 horizontal stripes, have a gray belly, green bands between the eyes and light brown fins. In addition to the just described Normal morphe in this type O-morphs and orange-speckled black OB-morphs orange are known. In the OB morph, the upper half of the body is largely orange, the lower half is very light white-bluish in color. The scales have orange edges that are wide on the upper half of the body and narrow on the lower half. In addition, the head and trunk are patterned by large blackish to dark blue spots.
The males of the blue normal morphs from Maylandia mbenjii differ from Maylandia greshakei only in their blunt head and the not so intensely colored caudal fin.
The jaws are covered with two to four rows of teeth. The teeth of the outermost row of teeth are usually two-pointed, some at the back are single-pointed. The teeth of the inner rows of teeth are three-pointed. On the first gill arch there are 11 to 13 gill rakes on the ceratobranchial, 2 to 3 on the epibranchial and one between these gill arch elements.
- Fin formula : dorsal XVII – XVIII / 8–10, anals III / 6–8, pectorals 12–14.
- Scale formula : SL 30–32.
Like almost all Malawi cichlids and all mbuna, Maylandia mbenjii is an ovophilic mouthbrooder in which the female takes care of the brood.
literature
- Stauffer, JR, Jr., NJ Bowers, KA Kellogg & KR McKaye (1997): A revision of the blue-black Pseudotropheus zebra (Teleostei: Cichlidae) complex from Lake Malawi, Africa, with a description of a new genus and ten new species. Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, Vol. 148, Oct. 31, 1997 JSTOR, pp. 210-213
Web links
- Maylandia mbenjii on Fishbase.org (English)
- Metriaclima mbenjii in the endangered Red List species the IUCN 2006. Posted by: Kazembe, J., 2006. Accessed September 1, 2016th