About 75 km from location 1, on the road to Mangochi we stopped to question some local lads about the presence of colourful Mtemba - small fish pronounced Ma'Demba - in the area (referred to by Jubb as N.sp.Mangochi). This was were I received the biggest shock of my life.

Helpers at Abrahamu

Shaulos with two boys from Abrahamu village.

Abrahamu Pan
Dr.R.A.Jubb quotes Peters as saying 'When they are baked they provide an excellent dish'. I discovered that in Malawi they do not bake the Mtemba, but boil them. Anyway, there were none in this area.

Five kilometers further we found a likely looking pan near a village called Abrahamu. Shaulos was assured by the locals that this Dambo, although rather large and very dirty, was annual and contained both colourful Mtemba and plain brown ones too. After netting for a short while we caught the largest Nothobranchius I have ever seen. Within 30 minutes we had caught about 50 fish. After selecting 5 trio's we returned the balance to the pan, much to the local's disgust. To return good food to the Dambo was just too much for them.

The male of this species reminds me of an overgrown N.melanospilus. The female however, is quite plain.

As it was getting quite late and we had a 3 hour drive back to base we called it a day.

Click for an image of N.sp.Abrahamu.