Shell thief cichlid

Care at a glance

Overview

The shell thief is kept as a colony built around one dominant male and a harem of much smaller females, all living over a pile of empty snail shells. The male collects and defends the shells; the females breed inside them. It is aggressive and will bully, so keep only robust tankmates and give it a large, sandy, shell-strewn floor. Feed meaty frozen foods and quality pellets. A tank of around 300 liters gives a group room for a proper shell bed and the roaming this fish does.

In the wild

Lamprologus callipterus works the shell beds of Lake Tanganyika, moving over the bottom in roving groups to gather empty snail shells. Give it the lake's hard, strongly alkaline, warm water at pH 7.8-9.0 and 24-27 C, a sandy floor, and a heap of empty snail shells for the males to collect and defend.

Good to know

Lamprologus callipterus shows one of the most extreme size differences of any vertebrate: males reach about 13 centimeters and are more than ten times the weight of the tiny females, which stay small enough to breed inside the shells the males gather. Males run large harems, and breeding is of medium difficulty.

Did you know

Males do not just collect shells, they steal them. A male will raid a rival's nest and carry off a shell in his mouth to add to his own pile, and sometimes a female is still tucked inside the shell he makes off with.

Common questions

Related species

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• Lemaire's lamprologus

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• 

  Gold ocellatus shell dweller

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• 

  Ornate shell dweller

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• 

  Black ocellatus

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