 There is little doubt that "Haplochromis" played an important role in returning detritus and plankton back into solution.With some 80 percent of "Haplochromis" species feeding off detritus, and equally capable of feeding off one another, they represented a tight, internal recycling system, moving nutrients and biomass both vertically and horizontally through the water column, and even out of the lake via predation by humans and terrestrial animals.The removal of "Haplochromis", however, may have contributed to the increasing frequency of algal blooms, which may in turn be responsible for mass fish kills.