Bathybatini

Bathybates ferox

The Bathybatini are a tribe of cichlids ( Cichlidae ). All kinds of live Bathybatini endemic in Lake Tanganyika.

Features

The different types of Bathybatini are 7 to 40 cm long. Your body is elongated, slightly elevated and laterally flattened. Your color is silvery. Trunk and head are patterned by various dark and blue stripes, dots, or a combination of both. The deeply divided mouth is filled with large and sharp, conical teeth. The carnivorous fish feed itself, the two growing genera Bathybates and Hemibates mainly of fish, the smaller Trematocara species of insect larvae and crustaceans. All Bathybatini are mouth brooders. The eggs of the largest species can reach a diameter of 8.5 mm, making them the largest cichlid eggs.

Species and genera

There are three genera and 17 species:

• Genus Bathybates Bathybates fasciatus Boulenger, 1901
• Bathybates ferox Boulenger, 1898
• Bathybates graueri Steindachner, 1911
• Bathybates hornii Steindachner, 1911
• Bathybates leo Poll, 1956
• Bathybates minor Boulenger, 1906
• Bathybates vittatus Boulenger, 1914

• Hemibates stenosoma ( Boulenger, 1901)

• Trematocara caparti Poll, 1948
• Trematocara kufferathi Poll, 1948
• Trematocara macrostoma Poll, 1952
• Trematocara marginatum Boulenger, 1899
• Trematocara nigrifrons Boulenger, 1906
• Trematocara stigmaticum Poll, 1943
• Trematocara unimaculatum Boulenger, 1901
• Trematocara variabile Poll, 1952
• Trematocara zebra De Vos, Nshombo & Thys van den Audenaerde, 1996

Swell

• Mark Smith: Lake Tanganyika Cichlids. Barron 's Educational Series, 1998, ISBN 0764106155

• Cichlids
• Cichlidae