Paedophagy literally means the "consumption of children". It is a term used to describe the feeding

Feeding

Feeding is the process by which organisms, typically animals, obtain food. Terminology often uses either the suffix -vore from Latin vorare, meaning 'to devour', or phagy, from Greek φαγειν, meaning 'to eat'.-Evolutionary history:...

 behaviour of fish

Fish

Fish are a paraphyletic group of organisms that consist of all gill-bearing aquatic vertebrate animals that lack limbs with digits. Included in this definition are the living hagfish, lampreys, and cartilaginous and bony fish, as well as various extinct related groups...

, or other animals, whose diet is partially, or primarily the eggs

Egg (biology)

An egg is an organic vessel in which an embryo first begins to develop. In most birds, reptiles, insects, molluscs, fish, and monotremes, an egg is the zygote, resulting from fertilization of the ovum, which is expelled from the body and permitted to develop outside the body until the developing...

 or larva

Larva

A larva is a distinct juvenile form many animals undergo before metamorphosis into adults. Animals with indirect development such as insects, amphibians, or cnidarians typically have a larval phase of their life cycle...

e of other animals. The term is frequently applied to various species of cichlid

Cichlid

Cichlids are fishes from the family Cichlidae in the order Perciformes. Cichlids are members of a group known as the Labroidei along with the wrasses , damselfish , and surfperches . This family is both large and diverse. At least 1,300 species have been scientifically described, making it one of...

 fish from Lake Malawi

Lake Malawi

Lake Malawi , is an African Great Lake and the southernmost lake in the Great Rift Valley system of East Africa. This lake, the third largest in Africa and the eighth largest lake in the world, is located between Malawi, Mozambique, and Tanzania...

 of the genera Caprichromis

Caprichromis

Caprichromis is a small genus of haplochromine cichlids endemic to Lake Malawi in East Africa. This genus contains noted paedophagous cichlids, specialising in the eating of eggs and fry of other cichlid species....

, Hemissdstaeniochromis, and Naevochromis. In Lake Tanganyika

Lake Tanganyika

Lake Tanganyika is an African Great Lake. It is estimated to be the second largest freshwater lake in the world by volume, and the second deepest, after Lake Baikal in Siberia; it is also the world's longest freshwater lake...

 species of the genus Haplotaxodon and possibly Greenwoodochromis bellcrossi may also be implicated in this sort of feeding strategy. The orange chromide

Orange chromide

The Orange chromide is a species of fish endemic to freshwater and brackish streams, lagoons and estuaries in southern India and Sri Lanka. The species is popular with fishkeeping hobbyists, and is kept frequently in aquariums...

, (Etroplus maculatus) is also a paedophagous cichlid.

Some paedophagus fish specialise in feeding on the young of mouthbrooding cichlids, ramming the buccal

Buccal

Buccal may refer to:* Mouth, a body cavity** Specifically the cheek* Buccal artery...

cavity of the mouthbrooder to dislodge, and then consume the eggs or larvae held within.