Epiplatys bifasciatus and Hemichromis fasciatus, are recorded for the first time from
the Sahara desert, in Lake Boukou and Lake Djara respectively, two of the seven Ounianga Serir lakes in northern Chad.
The nearest known populations of these two species are located 900 km to the southwest in Lake Chad. The Ounianga
Serir lakes, which resisted the increasing aridity of Sahara since the Holocene by virtue of subsurface inflow of fresh
groundwater from a large fossil aquifer, present the richest relict fish fauna of the Sahara, with at least eight species, including
also Hemichromis cf. letourneuxi, Sarotherodon galilaeus borkuanus, Coptodon zillii, Astatotilapia tchadensis,
Polypterus senegalus and Poropanchax norman
Relict fish fauna of the Sahara. See "Epiplatys bifasciatus (Steindachner, 1881) (Nothobranchiidae) and Hemichromis fasciatus Peters, 1852 (Cichlidae), two relict fish species in the Sahara desert" (PDF) by Sébastien Trape