Opthalmotilapia Ventralis

By Eric Rogne, MAS

Opthalmotilapia Ventralis is known as one of the feather fin cichlids of Lake Tanganyika. The vigorous personality and vibrant color in territorial males is what intrigued me about this species.

This species has a large distribution over Lake Tanganyika with many color variations over different locations. Males display bright variations of metallic black and blue with gold, light blue, white, black etc. highlights. Some yellow forms are even known in the northern part of the lake. This species has a fairly streamlined body. Males have extremely elongated pelvic fins with yellow lappets at the tips. These yellow lappets are the most realistic egg dummies known. Males also have slightly elongated dorsal, anal and caudal fins. Males obtain a size of around 15cm. with females slightly smaller. Females display a silver-gray coloration.

In the wild males defend territories on rocks meters above the lake’s floor chasing away conspecific males and attracting females. Females school in groups of 500 or more. A male will display and lead a female from the group to his territory. Males usually don’t make an elaborate nest in the wild. They usually move a little sand around that is located on a flat rock. When courting the male will lead the female in a head to tail dance while he flutters his fins. At times he will lift his body from the nest, while his pelvic fins remain in contact with the nest. Being mouth brooding, the yellow lappets attract the female to place them in her mouth. The lappets, being so identical to real eggs in color and size, ensure proper fertilization of the brood of eggs. A single female will spawn with various males in a single brood, generally holding 20 to 30 eggs.

In captivity it is not as hard to spawn Opthalmotilapia Ventralis, as it is to get the females to hold for even a few days. The males are extremely aggressive towards both males and females of conspecific. I suggest housing this species in a six foot 100 gallon or larger aquarium. I recommend the use of sand as substrate. I also use piles of rocks on both ends of the aquarium with the middle open. I used limestone sheet and slate rock. Tall plastic plants can give holding females a place to retreat from a dominant male. Purchase a group of Opthalmotilapia Ventralis to minimize direct aggression. I also would mix a large amount of dither fish. Various Lamprologous species work well, but I found Malawian Haps of the same size to be more effective. I had the problem of losing Opthalmotilapia Ventralis from a group and couldn’t get the female to hold longer than a day for a few years. One day I placed many mid-size to larger Alonocara, Protomelas and Copadichromis males into the Opthalmotilapia Ventralis 125. These were fish that I was clearing out of the fish room and wanted to open up more table space. I over stocked the tank. A few days later I noticed another female holding. I didn’t want to deal with striping her that day, so I let her be. I found that with a tank full of large haps the dominant male Opthalmotilapia Ventralis was too preoccupied to harass the female to hold six days before striping her and moving the fry to a tumbler to develop.

The young developed well and were rather large in size. They also tend to be dominant when housed with other African cichlid fry. Growth also seems fast, being similar to that of Malawian Mbuna.

Opthalmotilapia Ventralis is an exciting species of fish to watch with their flashy color and vigorous personality. Although they don’t always maintain bright colors, if you add multiple males wit higher ratios of females, at least one male will maintain full color. Subdominant males will flash colors on and off when challenging other males. Although a large aquarium and lots of other fish are needed, Opthalmotilapia Ventralis is certainly worth the space occupied.