The fish of Dubai's desert lakes - part 2 underwater footage

[mattybecks]

The dark ones look like dominant male Oreochromis mossambicus (or close cousins) while many of the lighter ones look like females of the same species (you can often see the tilapia spot in the posterior of the dorsal fin in the video), and there seem to be a few other Tilapine species as well (some could be Coptodon zilli).
Zillii below


The schools of small species are interesting, I'm wondering if they are Alcolapia species from the salty, desert lakes in the Lake Natron area. of Africa.
Below a cichlid from that lake, Alcolapia alcalicus, they remain small, and tolerate very high temps, and saline conditions.

a female holding below

There are perhaps at least 100 species of Tilapines so pinning down species is anybodies guess.
Below another Tilapine, Saratherodon linnelli

Thanks these are great pics.

 

[mattybecks]

Here are some more of the dozen or so Tilapines I have kept, some look similar some quite different.
Stomatepia pindu from Lake Barombi mbo, probably one of my favorites.

Konia eisentraute also from Barombi mbo

Stomatepia mariae from Barombi mbo

Coptodon bythobates from Lake Bermin

Oreochromis niloticus

and Oreochromis tanganicae

many hard to tell apart, some different as night and day
below another shot of Alcolapia alcalicus, another favorite

These ones too. I had no idea there was such variety. Im thinking some of the ones in the lake might have crossed bred with each other over the generations?

 

[mattybecks]

What music did you use in this?

Just standard stuff that was on my Nokia video camera. Not really a song, just a " sound effect" it is labelled as.

 

[mattybecks]

About 2min into the video you will see loads of little fish. Would those be a type if killifish?
I think I have seen them around before in ponds in residential areas here.

 

[mattybecks]

Yea thst is interesting. The dark ones really look African but some of the lighter ones looked SA, probably in actuality male female but....
Honestly the entire video I was waiting for a sting ray to take off out of the sand.
Are those lakes really shallow? Sorry if you mentioned that already in the other thread.

I also thought some of them looked CA/SA type of cichlid. But as you say, male/female africans more likely

 

[mattybecks]

The dark ones look like dominant male Oreochromis mossambicus (or close cousins) while many of the lighter ones look like females of the same species (you can often see the tilapia spot in the posterior of the dorsal fin in the video), and there seem to be a few other Tilapine species as well (some could be Coptodon zilli).
Zillii below


The schools of small species are interesting, I'm wondering if they are Alcolapia species from the salty, desert lakes in the Lake Natron area. of Africa.
Below a cichlid from that lake, Alcolapia alcalicus, they remain small, and tolerate very high temps, and saline conditions.

a female holding below

There are perhaps at least 100 species of Tilapines so pinning down species is anybodies guess.
Below another Tilapine, Saratherodon linnelli

Oreochromis mossambicus - I think I agree with you on this one. the darker males I saw did look like them.

 

[duanes]

About 2min into the video you will see loads of little fish. Would those be a type if killifish?
I think I have seen them around before in ponds in residential areas here.

I was thinking killis too, perfect for places that dry up

 

[Ulu]

Dubai is turning out to be a very interesting place. Are we talking about man-made lakes here or are these natural? Does the water come from an Artesian source?

If it wasn't for 170 years of irrigation it would look pretty much like a desert where I live.

Almost every one of our lakes is man-made, or else it's just a shallow puddle by comparison.

This is very interesting and makes me want to take up some underwater photography from my little boat.

It's been raining heavily here and all the lakes are muddy so things will have to clear up quite a bit.

 

[mattybecks]

Dubai is turning out to be a very interesting place. Are we talking about man-made lakes here or are these natural? Does the water come from an Artesian source?

If it wasn't for 170 years of irrigation it would look pretty much like a desert where I live.

Almost every one of our lakes is man-made, or else it's just a shallow puddle by comparison.

This is very interesting and makes me want to take up some underwater photography from my little boat.

It's been raining heavily here and all the lakes are muddy so things will have to clear up quite a bit.

The Lakes I am referring too are all man made ones.
Now there is a lot of water below Dubai here. About 1.5 - 2m from the surface. When there is construction works here or new buildings going up (which is annoyingly everywhere and all the time) there are pumps running day and night pumping water out. However this water is salty water, and this is just around the city here and in my area. There are really big artesian and fresh water ground sources too, but those are closer to the mountains here. Hatta/Ras al Khaimah/Fujeriah/ Al Ain side if that means anything to you. A lot of bottled water comes from there. Otherwise there is drip irrigation everywhere for the plants and grasses. That and the tap water is all de-salinated water straight from the ocean. What I like about that is that there is no fluorine's and those chemicals added to the water.

 

[mattybecks]

Dubai is turning out to be a very interesting place. Are we talking about man-made lakes here or are these natural? Does the water come from an Artesian source?

If it wasn't for 170 years of irrigation it would look pretty much like a desert where I live.

Almost every one of our lakes is man-made, or else it's just a shallow puddle by comparison.

This is very interesting and makes me want to take up some underwater photography from my little boat.

It's been raining heavily here and all the lakes are muddy so things will have to clear up quite a bit.

This isn't Dubai, but these pics are from Oman just over the boarder when I took a drive there (Neighboring country to UAE).
This is all fresh water. And yes I saw many small cichlids in here. But they were not the same cichlids as I have seen in Dubai. They were mostly quite shallow too