Lamprologus ornatipinnis "Burundi"
Burundi — boo-ROON-dee (approx.)
The fish
How this cichlid is built, and everything about how it lives, eats and breeds, is shared with the species — this page doesn't repeat it.
Read the full Neolamprologus ornatipinnis account →Specific to Burundi
- Collection locality & coordinates
- Local coloration — best judged from the living-fish photo
- Kept as a single-provenance line, never crossed with other collection points
Care facts below are the species' — shared with Neolamprologus ornatipinnis.
The Burundi population
Lamprologus ornatipinnis "Burundi" is the Burundi population of Lamprologus ornatipinnis, a geographic colour form from the Burundi coast of Lake Tanganyika in the far northern part of the lake. It is the same species as Lamprologus ornatipinnis, distinguished by its collection locality and local coloration; aquarists keep and breed it as a discrete, provenance-labelled line.
Colour reference: living Burundi fish at tanganyika.si →
About the species
Neolamprologus ornatipinnis is a small, sand-and-shell cichlid endemic to Lake Tanganyika, described by Max Poll in 1949 from deep water off the Congolese shore. It is one of the lake's many "shell-associated" lamprologines, yet it sits in an awkward middle ground: too large to live tucked inside a snail shell like a true shell-dweller, but dependent on empty Neothauma shells to breed. Females are dwarfed by males and famously hard to see, while a breeding male defending his harem can turn from retiring to ferocious almost overnight.
Full Neolamprologus ornatipinnis account →Sources
- tanganyika.si — Lamprologus ornatipinnis "Burundi"
- Eschmeyer's Catalog of Fishes: Lamprologus ornatipinnis (species record)
- FishBase: Lamprologus ornatipinnis Poll, 1949
- GBIF: Lamprologus ornatipinnis Poll, 1949
- FishBase occurrence records (GBIF + FB point data)
- Maréchal & Poll (1991), Check-list of the Freshwater Fishes of Africa (CLOFFA IV), Lamprologus
- IUCN Red List — Lamprologus ornatipinnis "Burundi"