NO. 5 (1920) CICHLID FISHES OF MALABAR l6l 



Dr. Boulenger in describing the care of the young by the female 

 Cichlids of Africa observes as follows : — 



"... So far as I could speak from personal observation 

 . . . it is invariably the female who thus carries the eggs 

 This was in contradiction to statements made by Lortet and by 

 Gunther who ascribed this habit to the male in the species of the 

 same genus with which they had dealt . . . It therefore remains 

 unproved whether in any of the African or Syrian Cichlids the 

 buccal incubation, as it has been called by Dr. Pelligrin, devolves 

 on the male. " 



On all possible occasions I have taken care to ascertain the sex 

 of the fish which carry the young by actual observation of the 

 spawning and also by the examination of the genital glands ; I am 

 convinced that, although the male helps his mate in carrying the 

 young from nest to nest, this duty is mainly performed by the female. 



When the yolk sac is absorbed and the pectoral fins become 

 functional, the larvseare led out by the parents to the neighbouring 

 open water. The female gathers them round her and the male 

 guards them against intruders. If frightened or otherwise dis- 

 turbed, the larvae take shelter in some hollow in the ground or cling 

 to bottom debris or under the parents' fins. For the first four days 

 they are collected together at sunset under the ventral fins of the 

 parents and led to some hollow where they are kept for the whole 

 night carefully guarded. The black ventral fins are very useful in 

 guiding the young ones and it is interesting to see the parent fish 

 attract their attention by rapidly spreading and closing these 

 fins twice or thrice. Mouth to mouth fighting is often found to 

 take place between parents bejonging to different broods and also 

 against wandering members of the same species. The parental 

 care lasts for a considerable time even after the young ones assume 

 the adult form. They feed chiefly on minute animal life found in 

 the bottom debris or hiding among mossy growth. They seem to 

 take vegetable food only after entering the late larval stage.- After 

 leaving the last pit they are never found to be picked up by the 

 parent in the mouth. 



The fish becomes sexually mature in the second year of its life. 

 It breeds twice a year, in May to June and again from November to 

 February, the maximal spawning being in January. A pair 

 singled out and kept in the experimental fish-pond, spawned first 

 in May 1917 and again in November of the same year. Spawning 

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