Maylandia

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Maylandia
Maylandia lombardoi photo by Gerard Delany
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia Phylum: Chordata Class: Actinopterygii Order: Perciformes Family: Cichlidae Genus: Maylandia Meyer and Foerster, 1984

The genus Maylandia contains around 15 species of cichlid fish endemic to Lake Malawi in Eastern Africa ^[1]. Like most malawi cichlids, all Maylandia species exhibit brood care via maternal mouthbrooding. Phylogenetically, Maylandia is part of the mbuna flock of haplochromine cichlids ^[2].

[edit] Maylandia or Metriaclima?

The name Maylandia was proposed as a subgenus of Pseudotropheus in 1984 ^[3]. If this group of fishes were then given their own genus separate from Pseudotropheus (as more recent consensus demands), Maylandia would then have priority over other genus names for this group ^[4][5][6]. It is the view of others, however, that the original Maylandia description is scientifically inadequate to define the group, making the name nomen nudem (literally, "meaning nothing") and that Metriaclima should be used for this group of fishes ^{[7][8][9][10]}.

However, this claim has been refuted by many other fish taxonomists ^{[11][12][13][14][15]} and in the aquarium literature ^[16][17], and as a result the issue remains a point of contention.

[edit] Species

• Maylandia benetos
• Maylandia callainos
• Maylandia chrysomallos
• Maylandia cyneusmarginatus
• Maylandia emmiltos
• Maylandia flavifemina
• Maylandia greshakei
• Maylandia hajomaylandi
• Maylandia lombardoi
• Maylandia mbenjii
• Maylandia melabranchion
• Maylandia phaeos
• Maylandia pyrsonotos
• Maylandia sandaracinos
• Maylandia thapsinogen
• Maylandia xanstomachus
• Maylandia zebra

• Pseudotropheus heteropictus is sometimes included in Maylandia, however, its taxonomic position remains unclear.

[edit] References