The Daffodil Cichlid of Lake Tanganyika lives in family clans where grown offspring help the parents raise the next broods. A striking species tank fish.
Overview
Neolamprologus pulcher is endemic to Lake Tanganyika, living along rocky shorelines at depths of 5-45 metres. Aquarists know it under the trade names "Daffodil" and "Princess of Zambia"; several geographic forms are available, differing in the intensity of their yellow. Its closest relative is the Princess of Burundi, long considered the same species and one it hybridises with freely in the aquarium.
Adults reach 7-10 cm and live 8-10 years. The body is elongated and greyish-beige with a soft yellow wash along the flanks and blue sparks in the unpaired fins. The tail is lyre-shaped with extended upper and lower rays, and the gill cover carries a distinctive dark marking edged in blue. Sexing by colour is nearly impossible: males are only slightly larger with marginally longer fin extensions.
What the species is really kept for is its social behaviour. N. pulcher lives not in pairs but in family clans: grown fry from previous broods stay alongside the breeding pair, forgo nests of their own and help the parents instead — guarding the territory, cleaning the clutch, clearing the entrance to the shelter. It is one of the few documented cases of cooperative breeding in fish, and it plays out fully in the aquarium provided the juveniles are left in place.
Care level is intermediate. The fish is undemanding about food and hardy, but it requires hard alkaline water and adequate floor area.
Tank Requirements
The minimum is 100 litres for a pair, but a clan of six to ten — which is how the species comes into its own — needs 200 litres and upwards at no less than 100 cm long. As with most Tanganyikan cichlids, floor area matters, not height.
Water parameters: temperature 24-26 °C, pH 7.8-9.0, general hardness (GH) 10-20 dGH. The species handles acidification badly, and a gradual downward drift in pH is the most common problem in these tanks.
Build the layout around stone. Assemble piles of flat rocks and slabs with caves, crevices and tunnels, resting them squarely on the tank floor rather than on the substrate: these fish dig energetically, and a structure set on a sand cushion will subside in time. Use sand 3-5 cm deep, and leave open swimming areas between the rock groups.
Plants are optional, but vallisneria and anubias grow well enough in hard water — anchor them outside the digging zone. Filtration should be strong, turning over five to six tank volumes per hour: the species likes clean, well-oxygenated water and moderate flow. Crushed coral in the filter is a convenient way to stabilise alkalinity.
Feeding and Diet
In nature N. pulcher feeds on zooplankton taken from the water column and on small invertebrates picked off the rock surfaces. It is a carnivore, but with no appetite for large prey.
The aquarium staple should be quality pellets and flakes for medium-sized cichlids. Two or three times a week add live and frozen foods: brine shrimp, cyclops, mysis, daphnia, small bloodworms. A small spirulina-based supplement once a week aids digestion.
As with all Tanganyikan cichlids, tubifex and foods made from warm-blooded animals are excluded entirely: fatty food provokes intestinal inflammation, which runs a severe course in this group.
Feed adults twice a day in portions consumed within a couple of minutes. The clan feeds together and fast, but make sure the food reaches the juveniles too, not only the dominant pair.
Care and Maintenance
A weekly 20-25% water change is mandatory. Prepare the water in advance and match it for hardness and pH: this species tolerates a swing towards soft water worse than a moderate build-up of nitrate.
Check pH weekly — in a tank with accumulating organics it creeps steadily downward, and a fall below 7.5 shows in the fish immediately. Keep nitrate below 25 mg/l, ammonia and nitrite at zero. Rinse filter media in old tank water every three to four weeks.
Vacuum the sand in open areas without destroying burrows and the excavations under rocks. Check the stability of the stonework periodically: the fish undermine the bases, and heavy rockwork can eventually collapse.
A healthy pulcher is active, holds station in the middle layer near its rock, keeps its fins spread and shows a crisp gill-cover marking. Warning signals are hanging in a corner, fading colour, refusing food and whitish stringy faeces. The main diseases are ich and intestinal infections from an unsuitable diet; quarantine new arrivals for two to three weeks.
Compatibility
N. pulcher is territorial, but its aggression is moderate and directed mainly at its own kind and at anything intruding on the nesting zone. Outside of spawning it is a perfectly sociable fish.
Good companions are Tanganyikan species occupying other levels and other kinds of shelter: Caudopunctatus Cichlid, Lemon Cichlid, Cylindricus Cichlid, Compressiceps Cichlid and Yellowfin Xenotilapia. On the bottom level the Dwarf Petricola Catfish and Cuckoo Catfish fit well.
A word on the Princess of Burundi: the two are so closely related that they produce hybrid offspring freely. Keep them together only if breeding does not interest you.
Unsuitable: shell dwellers in a small tank, which will be pushed off the sandy patches; large aggressive Malawians such as the Auratus Cichlid; and any species needing soft acidic water.
Breeding
Breeding N. pulcher is simple and needs no separate breeding tank — indeed, removing the fish is not merely unnecessary but counterproductive: all the species' interesting behaviour emerges only in the intact group.
Do not hand-pick a pair. Take six to eight juveniles, grow them on together and wait for a dominant pair to form; the rest will remain in the clan as helpers. Sexual maturity comes at eight to twelve months.
Spawning conditions: temperature 25-26 °C, pH 8.0-8.5, stable parameters and a suitable shelter — a cave, a crevice between rocks or a ceramic tube. The female lays 50-200 eggs on the ceiling or wall of the shelter. Incubation takes two to three days, and the larvae stay in the cave for roughly another week.
Then comes the interesting part. The parents shepherd the brood near the nest while helpers from earlier generations patrol the territory's borders and see off intruders — in the aquarium you can often watch a juvenile drive a larger fish away from the shelter entrance. Fry take brine shrimp nauplii and microworms from the first days and grow up comfortably alongside the adults.
There is no need to move the young out until the clan outgrows the tank. The sign that it is time is a rise in serious scuffles and torn fins among the juveniles: it means no free territory is left.