Littoral Fish Fauna near Uvira, Northwestern End of Lake Tanganyika

Abstract

The fish fauna near Uvira is composed of 13 families and more than 110 species--38 of non-cichlids and 72 of cichlids. It is considerably different from that in the Ruzizi estuaries and on the Luhanga rocky shores. Stream or estuary species such as Protopterus, Sarogherodon niloticus and cyprinids are abundant in the former, while Synodontis, Mastacembelus and cichlid fishes are in the latter. Some stream or estuary fishes such as Citharinus, Hydrocynus and Tetraodon, which are common in the Maragarasi estuaries, do not seem to inhabit near the Ruzizis. The proportion of endemic species is much higher on the rocky shores than at the muddy area and especially that of cichlids reaches 100%. Sixty-one species of cichilds inhabit the rocky shore of Luhanga in high density and most of them are rock dwellers except Boulengerochromis and Hemibates etc. The proportion of the rock dwellers at Luhanga to the whole rock dwellers of the lake is also high, reaching 70% in cichlids.