Paideia class given at Reed College in 2010 to a general audience on how awesome cichlid fish are.

1. The Cichlid Fish of Africa

2. What’s a cichlid?

4. Cichlids (sick-lids)
• Are a family of fish
• Found mainly in Africa and South
America
• A shit ton of species

5. Kenya
Lake Victoria
Tanzania
Uganda
Rwanda
Burundi
Zambia
Lake Malawi
Lake Tanganyika
The Great
Lakes of
Africa
Malawi

6. How many species?
Location # Fish Species
Hawaiian Islands ~600
Europe 215
245
Great Lakes of
North America
Cichlids of Africa >1300
All one family!

7. Who cares about cichlids?
• Fish farmers
(and fish eaters)
• Hobbyists
• Biologists

8. Diversity- color and
morphology

9. Jaws
• Cichlids have two sets of jaws!
– Just like Alien
• Inner jaws mash food
• Outer jaws have teeth adapted
to their diet

10. Fish food
• Plankton
• Aufwuchs : algae and the
microorganisms that live on it
• Sponges
– “like eating cardboard laced with indigestible fibers, ground glass in the form
of siliceous spicules, not to mention noxious chemicals”
• Other fish (piscivory)
• Other fishes’ scales (lepidophagy)
• Caviar (oophagy)

11. Parenting skills
• Parental care is rare in fishes,
but common in cichlids
• Some cichlids use their big
mouths to carry eggs and fry!
• Some guard their fry in nests,
chasing off predators

12. Hooking up
• Cichlids have a variety of different mating
systems
(1) Polygyny with Lekking
Lek- gathering of males,
competitve mating display

13. Hooking up (for life)
• (2) Monogamy (aw)
• Monogamy rare in
animals, esp. fish
• Why monogamy?
– Biparental care
– Secure a high quality mate
& territory

14. Movies!
• “Jewel of the Rift” - Lake Tanganyika

15. Fish room tour

16. Julidochromis AKA Julies
Monogamy
Breed in rocky
caves/crevices
Aggressive
females

17. Astatotilapia burtoni
• Lekking males - 2 phenotypes T and NT
• Maternal Mouthbrooders
– Females become aggressive when brooding