Cichlids from Israel

[Juan Artigas]

Thanks Don for the suggestion. yes Rickson, it would be wonderful if you could get us some pictures for the Cichlid Room Companion!

[Paulo José Alves]

Thank you Rickson. Am I correct in assuming that the more colorful of the Israeli species are Tilapia Zillii in breeding colors ?

[rickson]

well you are partially right the Tilapia Zillii in breeding colors in the nature have beautiful colors with bright orange around its fins which makes him resemble a little bit to a green teror without a hump, but there is a specie that can be found only in one pond in the world, its a mutent that accidently occured. what probably happend is that a minerale called radon sprinkled from the ground to the watter and the relatively high salt concentration in the water caused the cichlid to have rich and beautiful colors. this fish is protected and its forbidden to grow it or to market it in stores. this cichlid lives in salty water his ominvore and very aggresive they live in large groups, most of them are small but there are rare individuales that grow to 12" this fish originated from the jordan tilapia by mistake!!! the fish dosnt have a scientific name only a common Hebrew name which is ainot tzokim tilapia.

[rickson]

Juan does it matters if the pictures are from another sites or do you want me to bring original pictures frome the wild?
if you want me to take original pictures frome the wild im affraid its goona take some time because lake Tiberias and the jordan river are far from where i live, and i would have to stay there at least for a couple of nights.

[Juan Artigas]

Rickson,

Pictures could be in aquarium of course. Now if you ever get pictures of habitats that would be wonderful. Thanks for your consideration.

[rickson]

i would love to do it juan.
i meant if its ok to bring phtos from israeli sites. because some of the endemic cichlids are hard to find and some are very rare if they exist at all. like the endemic cichlids of lake ahola that was dried out, and the only way to get there photo is from an israeli sites.
if you want you can take the Tilapia Zillii pictures that i raise since he was about 1" now hes over 9".
photos:
http://photos.walla.co.il/ts.cgi?tsscri ... =rickson24
http://photos.walla.co.il/ts.cgi?tsscri ... =rickson24
http://photos.walla.co.il/ts.cgi?tsscri ... =rickson24

[Juan Artigas]

Thanks Rickson, the problem is that I need to have specific permission to use the picture in teh Cichlid Room Companion, directly from the Copyright holder. If that can be achieved and the picture is good, then I would love to use them!

[Yan]

here is flavijosephi
http://aqua.israel.net/aquadex/config/P ... ictId=1926

It is not picture of A. flavijosephi.
There is a picture from site http://www.elacuarista.com with name
Protomelas fenestratus:
http://www.elacuarista.com/atlas/images ... tratus.jpg

Here are pictures of A. flavijosephi:
http://www.israquarium.co.il/FishPhoto/ ... 20male.jpg
http://www.israquarium.co.il/FishPhoto/ ... female.jpg

Yan
_______________________
http://www.israquarium.co.il

[rickson]

so you changed the photo in your website, its not my fault that you had a wrong picture befor. its a picture you put next to the A. flavijosephi.
by the way i liked the "new" A. flavijosephi his a better looking cichlid.

[Heiko Bleher]

Hi Guys and Juan,

I just saw this thread and wanted to ad some type locality informstion and species identification from the Middle East:
Tristramella simonis (Günther 1864) - is endemic to the Lakes Huleh [Hula] and Tiberias [Galilée], Israel
(The subspecies T. s. intermedia Steinitz [H.] & Ben-Tuvia [A.] in Ben-Tuvia 1959 is considered to be a synonym of T. simonis (Günther 1864)
Tristramella sacra (Günther 1865) – Lake Tiberias [Galilée], Israel.

Astatotilapia flaviijosephi (Lortet 1883) – is only known (naturally occurance, as the above) from Aun Nudauwara, in Syria, 32°50'N, 35°28'E.

Iranocichla hormuzensis Coad 1982 (no parentesis) – has its type locality in the Mehran River, Hormozdgan Province, southern Iran, 27°04'N, 54°35'E. But I researched in 20019 and 2010 and the river does not existe anymore. I found from the 22 spots listed by Coad for Iranicichla only 2 with water, but I found a third one. I know now only 3 locations were they still lve and all 3 have different populations:
1. normal colours as described, greyish, highbodies mediaum size cichlids, it is the typical known and described one;
1. a red colored population I found, the males have a veru orange red chest, very beautiful and hogh bodied fishes but the shortest of the 3 populations, and brought the back;
3. the known black population, were males should always be black, and this population is the most narrow one of the three. This can live in marine waters, I had it spawning with Anemon fishes...

These are the only native most eastern found cichlids, all others are introductions from Africa.

This just for your all information.

Best regards to all,

Heiko Bleher
www.aquapress-bleher.com

[Bojan Dolenc]

Yes, Heiko, just so! Astatotilapia flaviijosephi is Middle East Cichlid.

Some of the bibliography dealing with for Astatotilapia flaviijosephi & Tristramella sacra:
* Werner, Noam Y. & Ofer Mokady; 2004; "Swimming out of Africa: mitochondrial DNA evidence for late Pliocene dispersal of a cichlid from Central Africa to the Levant"; Biological Journal of the Linnean Society; v.82(1), pp.103–109. *

* Shirak, Andrey & Miri Cohen-Zinder, Renata M. Barroso, Eyal Seroussi, Micha Ron & Gideon Hulata; 2009; "DNA barcoding of Israeli indigenous and introduced cichlids"; The Israeli Journal of Aquaculture – Bamidgeh; v.61(2), pp.83-88. **
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Some of the bibliography dealing with for Iranocichla hormuzensis:
* Esmaeili, Hamid Reza & Zohreh Ganjali & Malihatozaman Monsefi; 2009; "Reproductive biology of the endemic Iranian cichlid, Iranocichla hormuzensis Coad, 1982 from Mehran River, southern Iran "; Environmental Biology of Fishes; v. 84(1), pp. 141-145

* Coad, Brian W. ; 1998; "Systematic biodiversity in the freshwater fishes of Iran "; Italian Journal of Zoology; v. 65(S1), pp. 101-108.

__________________
*= Abstract
The rich Levantine fauna and flora were shaped by millions of years of migration across the region, from Africa to Eurasia and vice versa. Most large-scale processes that led to this diversity have been relatively well studied. However, small-scale processes, and details such as the area of origin of particular groups, and the route and time of dispersal are often not as clear. This is the case with the endemic Levantine representatives of the fish family Cichlidae. In this work we combine genetic, palaeontological and geological data in an attempt to understand the dispersal of the cichlid fish Astatotilapia flaviijosephi (Lortet, 1883) from sub-Saharan Africa to the Levant. A. flaviijosephi is unique among the Levantine cichlids in being the only non-tilapiine. It is also the only haplochromine cichlid to be found out of Africa. A partial sequence of the control region of the mitochondrial DNA was used to determine A. flaviijosephi’s phylogenetic relationships with other African haplochromines, and to estimate its time of divergenc from this group. Combining our findings with palaeontological and geological data, we suggest that A. flaviijosephi separated from the other haplochromines during the middle to late Pliocene (2.5–3.3 Mya) and probably dispersed from Africa to the Levant via the Nile.

**= Abstract
The objectives of this study were barcoding and taxonomic analysis of the five tilapiine species (Oreochromisaureus,O.niloticus,O.mossambicus, Sarotherodon galilaeus, and Tilapia zillii), two tilapia hybrid strains (Florida red tilapia and Philippine red tilapia), and two endemic wild cichlids (Tristramella simonis and Astatotilapia flaviijosephi) available in Israel, as well as O. urolepis hornorum. Cytochrome oxidase subunit I (COI) 619 bp sequence traces of 104 individuals were assembled, aligned, and compared (GenBank project GI 209553463). The DNA sequences of two hybrid strains were identical to those of O. hornorum and O. aureus. Absence of intra-specific variability was detected in the commercially used species, O. aureus, S. galilaeus, O. mossambicus, and O. urolepis hornorum. Two DNA sequence variants were detected in O. niloticus originating from Ghana and Egypt. In contrast, 2-3 variants were detected in the DNA of each of the non-commercial species. Amino-acid sequences were identical in all “true tilapias” and different from the sequences in the endemic cichlids.

[Paulo José Alves]

Hi

All the species that are not in Bleher´s list are introduced in Israel? That is quite controversial, A. flavijosephi existes in Israel and It does make sense that it does, existing also in Syria, I would be very surprised if it is not from Israel. Sarotherodon galilaeus and Tilapia zilli are also introduced?... So the "galilaeus" name , the famous ST. Peter´s fish is a hoax? it´s not from there? But then what fish did the Christ´s disciple fish when he lived there?!... About the Oreochromis species Anton Lamboj did tell me that they are most likely introduced and not from there as originally thought.

All The Best
Paulo José

[Bas Pels]

Tristramella simonis (Günther 1864) - is endemic to the Lakes Huleh [Hula] and Tiberias [Galilée], Israel
(The subspecies T. s. intermedia Steinitz [H.] & Ben-Tuvia [A.] in Ben-Tuvia 1959 is considered to be a synonym of T. simonis (Günther 1864)
Tristramella sacra (Günther 1865) – Lake Tiberias [Galilée], Israel.

I know nothing of Tilapiini, but perhaps one of the above used to be Sarotherodon galilaeus?

It is well known this lake Tiberias does have a Tilapid fish, which is NOT introduced. But I have not a clue about its taxonomic status.

Obviously, Heiko Bleher forgot about the Etroplus species from India

[Bojan Dolenc]

...

Obviously, Heiko Bleher forgot about the Etroplus species from India

Etroplus spp. are from the zoogeographic region Asia, not from Middle East.

[Heiko Bleher]

Hi,

thanks Bojan.

Heiko Bleher
www.aquapress-bleher.com