West African lungfish

📖 Overview

Obligate air-breathing ; Obligate air-breathing . Found in marginal swamps and backwaters of rivers and lakes . Carnivorous, food includes molluscs , but also frogs, fish and seed . In Kenya it feeds mostly on plant material, like roots . Strongly associated with life of aquatic plants in terms of breeding and feeding ecologies; nests are made in weedy areas . Normally lives on flood plains and secretes, when these dry up during the dry season, a thin slime around itself which dries into a fragile cocoon; normally hibernates from the end of one wet season to the start of the next, buut can live in its cocoon for over a year . For hibernating the fish literally chews its way into the substrate ejecting mud out of its gill openings, reaching a depth of 3-25 cm below the surface depending on the length of the fish; the lungfish wriggles around, thereby hollowing out a bulb-shaped chamber and coming to rest with its nose pointing upward; they breathe air at the mouth of the chamber's tube and then sink back into the expanded part of the chamber . As the water disappears the respiratory trips cease; air reaches the fish via the tube to the surface . Under aquatic conditions this lungfish can survive more than three and half years of starvation, showing the same behavior - no motion and same body posture - as an aestivating specimen .

🔬 Taxonomy

🐟 Physical Description

Diagnosis: Protopterus annectens annectens has an elongate body and paired fins are long and filamentous . The trunk, with 34-37 ribs, is a bit longer and the tail a bit shorter compared to Protopterus annectens brieni . : elongated; Cross section: circular.

🌀 Behaviour

Behavioural data for West African lungfish is currently being reviewed.

🦐 Diet

🥚 Reproduction

Lungfish spawn in the swamps during the wet season, building a nest in which the eggs, white in colour and about 4 mm diameter, are laid; young are cared for by the males . Larvae hatch in eight days, and leave the nest in twenty days . Males of Protopterus annectens brieni excavate an U-shaped burrow to a depth of nearly 60 cm for spawning purposes; nest is usually placed amongst roots of aquatic vegetation where the male will attend to several females during the breeding season; males aerate the eggs with body and fin movements and provide protection to the young for some time after incubation .

🌍 Habitat & Distribution

Freshwater; demersal; potamodromous . Tropical; 25°C - 30°C ; 22°N - 30°S east coast rivers south to the Limpopo River (Ref.

🌿 Ecology

📐 Morphometrics

🌡️ Water Parameters & Tolerance

🛡️ Conservation Assessment

📊 Population Risk & Fisheries

🐠 Related Species

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