Critically Endangered
Lake Chala tilapia
Oreochromis hunteri
The Lake Chala tilapia is a cichlid fish that is endemic to Lake Chala, a small crater lake on the border of Kenya and Rombo District of Kilimanjaro Region in Tanzania.
Appearance
O. Hunteri is characterized by their large, compressed bodies with a terminal mouth and forward snout. Teeth are small oriented in a narrow band made to crush shells of small invertebrates and a narrow pharyngeal bone. Their dorsal fins are continuous with 15-18 spines and 12-14 rays.
Studies show that this genus have a moderate growth rate and are sexually matured when they reach at least 8 – 10 cm in length. The Lake Chala tilapia can reach a standard length of up to 30 cm (12 in).
Range and habitat
O. Hunteri is native to Lake Chala, a small (4.2 km²) crater lake located on the border between Kenya and Tanzania near Mount Kilimanjaro (3°19′S, 37°42′E). O. Hunteri consists of occupying zones in the water column that is near the shore, that is known as the littoral zone, as well as open pelagic waters of the lake that is known as the limnetic zone. Even so, from the introduction of invasive tilapia species, O. Hunteri has a much narrower distribution, demonstrating a higher abundance in the limnetic zone of Lake Chala.
Pins are Wikidata “endemic to” fields. Orange dots, when present, are GBIF occurrence tiles — survey bias included.
Diet
Cichlids defend a territory or a brood. Diet in the family runs from algae scrapers to piscivores; this page does not invent a menu for one species.
In crisis
It is considered critically endangered by the IUCN, with the two primary threats being deterioration of its habitat due to siltation, and other non-native tilapia species that have been introduced to Lake Chala. It is very closely related to the similar Jipe tilapia (O. Jipe), another highly threatened species from the same general region of Kenya and Tanzania. Lake Chala tilapia is currently listed as critically endangered, due to its limited geographic range from being in a single crater and having its realized niche smaller due to competition from the invasive tilapia species.
Phenotypic variability within Lake Chala Tilapia remained consistent and there was no hybridization with other invasive species, giving us an understanding that O. Hunteri did not acquire new traits or character displacement from the invasive tilapia species that caused its niche breadth to be smaller due to exploitative competition, resulting in competitive exclusion, forcing O. Hunteri to feed in deeper waters that marked them as critically endangered from the IUCN. Another reason for their decline in population is habitat destruction.
Lake Chala tilapia is Critically Endangered on this catalog because that is the IUCN category stored on Wikidata. Confirm the official criteria and any later count on iucnredlist.org.
Sources
Written for this catalog from the English Wikipedia article on Lake Chala tilapia, Wikidata item Q1827030. Family and order context is original field-guide writing about the group, not a copied assessment of this one species. Wikipedia text is CC BY-SA. Not an IUCN assessment. Counts, when quoted, can change — confirm them on the recovery programme and on iucnredlist.org.
