Snail cichlid

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Lamprologus callipterus , male during mating; the female is inside the snail shell.

Snail shell from Neothauma tanganyicense

As snails cichlids or snail perch some are in the East African Lake Tanganyika endemic , cave brooding cichlid called that their eggs in empty snail shells of tanganyicense Neothauma or the genera Lavigeria , Paramelania or Pila place. In some cases the males of these cichlids become significantly larger ( sexual dimorphism ) so that they do not fit into the snail shell and brood care is only taken over by the female, while the males defend the territory .

Because of their interesting reproductive behavior and their small size, the Tanganyika snailfish are often kept in aquariums .

Snail cichlids come in five lamprologine genera:

• Altolamprologus
  • Altolamprologus sp. "shell" (previously undescribed )
• Lamprologus
  • Lamprologus callipterus
  • Lamprologus laparogramma
  • Lamprologus lemairii
  • Lamprologus meleagris
  • Lamprologus ocellatus
  • Lamprologus ornatipinnis
  • Lamprologus signatus
  • Lamprologus speciosus
• Lepidiolamprologus
  • Lepidiolamprologus attenuatus
  • Lepidiolamprologus boulengeri
• Neolamprologus
  • Neolamprologus brevis
  • Neolamprologus calliurus
  • Neolamprologus caudopunctatus
  • Neolamprologus hecqui
  • Neolamprologus fasciatus
  • Neolamprologus meeli
  • Neolamprologus multifasciatus
  • Neolamprologus similis
  • Neolamprologus wauthioni
• Telmatochromis
  • Telmatochromis bifrenatus
  • Telmatochromis brichardi
  • Telmatochromis dhonti
  • Telmatochromis temporalis (The species has two genetically and in their body size different morphs , one of which inhabits rock regions, the other inhabits snail shells)
  • Telmatochromis vittatus

Maylandia lanisticola , aspecies of cichlid endemic to Lake Malawi , is often referred to in German as the small snail perch or the Malawi snail cichlid. This species and Maylandia livingstonii onlyuse snail shells of the genus Lanistes as hiding places and tend their brood as mouthbrooders .

literature

• Stephan Koblmüller, Nina Duftner, Kristina M Sefc, Mitsuto Aibara, Martina Stipacek, Michel Blanc, Bernd Egger & Christian Sturmbauer: Reticulate phylogeny of gastropod-shell-breeding cichlids from Lake Tanganyika - the result of repeated introgressive hybridization. BMC Evolutionary Biology 2007, 7: 7 doi: 10.1186 / 1471-2148-7-7
• Georg Zurlo: Snail cichlids. In: Claus Schaefer, Torsten Schröer (Hrsg.): The large lexicon of aquaristics. Eugen Ulmer, Stuttgart 2004, ISBN 3-8001-7497-9 , p. 879.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Kai Winkelmann, Martin J. Genner, Tetsumi Takahashi, Lukas Rüber. Competition-driven speciation in cichlid fish. Nature Communications, 2014; 5 DOI: 10.1038 / ncomms4412 .
2. ^ Hans A. Baensch & Rüdiger Riehl: Aquariums Atlas, Volume 1 . Page 758, Mergus Verlag, 1997, ISBN 3-88244-101-1 .
3. ↑ Maylandia livingstonii on Fishbase.org (English).