Kampoyo

The kampango is among the largest fish in the Lake Malawi basin, reaching up to about 1 m (3.3 ft) long, or possibly even 1.5 m (4.9 ft). A common length is around 42 cm (1.4 ft) and females are typically larger than males. Adults are overall blackish, while young are grey with dark spots. During the day kampangos hide in caves, but around dusk or dawn they hunt and eat their prey, primarily cichlids.

Breeding. The male digs a shallow nest in the sandy bottom, often near rocks, where the female lays several thousand eggs. After hatching, the young mostly eat trophic (unfertilized) egg that their mother lays, but they also take invertebrates that the father brings to them in his mouth. The eggs and young are fiercely guarded by the parents. The young kampango only leave the protection of their parents when around 12 cm (4.7 in) long, but before that most have typically already been eaten by egg- and fry-stealing cichlids like Mylochromis melanonotus and Pseudotropheus crabro. At other times Pseudotropheus crabro has a mutualistic relationship with the kampango, as it will clean it by feeding on parasites and dead tissue. Another catfish, Bathyclarias nyasensis, is a brood parasite of the kampango. Kampango parents have been observed taking care of entire broods of B. nyasensis young as if they were their own. As these broods almost exclusively contain B. …