''Cyprichromis leptosoma'' is a

mouthbrooding Mouthbrooding, also known as oral incubation and buccal incubation, is the care given by some groups of animals to their offspring by holding them in the mouth of the parent for extended periods of time. Although mouthbrooding is performed by a va ...

species of

fish Fish are aquatic, craniate, gill-bearing animals that lack limbs with digits. Included in this definition are the living hagfish, lampreys, and cartilaginous and bony fish as well as various extinct related groups. Approximately 95% of li ...

in the family

Cichlidae Cichlids are fish from the family Cichlidae in the order Cichliformes. Cichlids were traditionally classed in a suborder, the Labroidei, along with the wrasses ( Labridae), in the order Perciformes, but molecular studies have contradicted thi ...

. It is

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsew ...

Lake Tanganyika Lake Tanganyika () is an African Great Lake. It is the second-oldest freshwater lake in the world, the second-largest by volume, and the second-deepest, in all cases after Lake Baikal in Siberia. It is the world's longest freshwater lake. ...

in Zambia and Tanzania. It seems quite common within its range and faces no particular threats, so the

International Union for Conservation of Nature The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN; officially International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources) is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natu ...

has assessed its conservation status as being of

least concern A least-concern species is a species that has been categorized by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as evaluated as not being a focus of species conservation because the specific species is still plentiful in the wild. T ...

Description

It is a streamlined fish with a silvery to blue body color. It grows to about 3 in (8 cm) in length. The males have either yellow or blue tails. The mouth is protrusable and forms a suction tube which is used for sucking in pelagic

zooplankton Zooplankton are the animal component of the planktonic community ("zoo" comes from the Greek word for ''animal''). Plankton are aquatic organisms that are unable to swim effectively against currents, and consequently drift or are carried along by ...

Ecology

''C. leptosoma'', like other fish in its

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus com ...

, has an unusual breeding strategy. Males form a three-dimensional

lek Lek or LEK may refer to: * Lek mating, mating in a lek, a type of animal territory in which males of a species gather * Albanian lek, the currency of Albania * Lek (magazine), a Norwegian softcore pornographic magazine * Lek (pharmaceutical comp ...

in mid-water. Females decide which males they want to mate with. If a female chooses to mate with a particular male, they will release an

egg An egg is an organic vessel grown by an animal to carry a possibly fertilized egg cell (a zygote) and to incubate from it an embryo within the egg until the embryo has become an animal fetus that can survive on its own, at which point the a ...

, which the male

fertilize Fertilisation or fertilization (see spelling differences), also known as generative fertilisation, syngamy and impregnation, is the fusion of gametes to give rise to a new individual organism or offspring and initiate its development. Proce ...

s in midwater. The female catches the egg in her mouth without the egg hitting the ground. The female protects and broods the eggs in her mouth until the fry hatch and are able to swim on their own. This takes about three weeks. At that point, the female releases the eggs into a rocky area for the fry's protection, and leaves them there on their own. ''C. leptosoma'' is a schooling species that lives in deep water. It is subject to several

predator Predation is a biological interaction where one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey. It is one of a family of common feeding behaviours that includes parasitism and micropredation (which usually do not kill th ...

s within Lake Tanganyika. The most prominent is ''

Cyphotilapia frontosa ''Cyphotilapia frontosa'', also called the front cichlid and frontosa cichlid, is an east African species of fish endemic to Lake Tanganyika. The genus name is a combination of the Ancient Greek "cypho-", meaning "curved", and ''tilapia'', which ...

'', which lives in deep water most of the time, but comes up to feed on ''C. leptosoma'' primarily at dawn.

Distribution

''C. leptosoma'' is endemic to Lake Tanganyika from the southern part in Zambia and along the eastern shoreline into Tanzania.

Description

Ecology

Distribution

References

Further reading