Melanochromis
| Melanochromis | ||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
.jpg)
Melanochromis auratus , female |
||||||||||||
| Systematics | ||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||
| Scientific name | ||||||||||||
| Melanochromis | ||||||||||||
| Trewavas , 1935 |
Melanochromis ( Gr .: "Melan (os)" (μέλας) = black (er); Chromis (genus of damselfish , in which cichlids were previously described)) is a genus of African cichlids (Cichlidae). They live endemically in Lake Malawi in East Africa and belong to thembuna boundto the biotope of the rocky coasts .
features
As with the closely related genus Pseudotropheus , all Melanochromis have larger, bilobed, outer jaw teeth, while the inner jaw teeth are small and three-pointed. In the types of melanochromis , however, the pharyngeal teeth are larger and they also have fewer.
Species were included in it, which in their black basic pigmentation, which is best recognized in juvenile fish and females, show clear transverse stripes and which lack horizontal stripes. In the sexually mature males, this basic pigmentation is overlaid by a bright, bright color. The pattern of the basic pigmentation is used for classification, since it is assumed that this pattern is little influenced by environmental factors and thus shows a phylogenetic relationship, in contrast to morphological features such as the teeth, which have changed significantly due to the rapid evolution of the Malawi cichlids .
Recently the diagnosis of the genus was revised and now the melanin pattern is used to determine the genus. The genus Melanochromis now only includes species that show two horizontal, black stripes on a light basic color on the sides of the body. The upper stripe is 1 to 2 scales wide, can be interrupted and lies below the base of the dorsal fin, the wider, lower stripe is 2 to 3 scales wide, always continuous and touches the lower sideline . In dominant animals, especially in reproductive males, possibly also in very old females, the color is often exactly the other way around, on a dark basic color there are two light, mostly whitish or light blue longitudinal stripes on each side of the body.
All Melanochromis species are oviphilic mouthbrooders .
species
_Melanochromis_parallelus.jpg)
- Turquoise goldfish ( Melanochromis auratus ) ( Boulenger , 1897) .
- Melanochromis baliodigma Bowers & Stauffer, 1997 .
- Melanochromis chipokae Johnson, 1975 .
- Melanochromis dialeptos Bowers & Stauffer, 1997 .
- Melanochromis heterochromis Bowers & Stauffer, 1993 .
- Melanochromis kaskazini Konings-Dudin, Konings & Stauffer, 2009 .
- Melanochromis lepidiadaptes Bowers & Stauffer, 1997 .
- Melanochromis loriae Johnson, 1975 .
- Melanochromis melanopterus (Trewavas, 1928) . ( Type species )
- Melanochromis mossambiquensis Konings-Dudin, Konings & Stauffer, 2009 .
- Melanochromis mpoto Konings & Stauffer, 2012 .
- Melanochromis robustus (Kullander, 1986) .
- Melanochromis simulans ( Regan , 1922) .
- Melanochromis vermivorus Trewavas, 1935 .
- Melanochromis wochepa Konings-Dudin, Konings & Stauffer, 2009 .
literature
- Adrianus F. Konings & Jay R. Stauffer, Jr .: Review of the Lake Malaŵi genus Melanochromis (Teleostei: Cichlidae) with a description of a new species. Zootaxa 3258, Apr. 2012, ISSN 1175-5334 PDF
- Günther Sterba : The world's freshwater fish. 2nd Edition. Urania, Leipzig / Jena / Berlin 1990, ISBN 3-332-00109-4 .
Web links
- Melanochromis on Fishbase.org (English)