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While the east coast of Australia is home to Paratya, this complex of species does not occur in the south west of the country. I wondered if they even had "glass shrimp" over there, so before my last trip I started trying to find out. Of course they have glass shrimp - what area with enough water about doesn't? Over in SW WA they have Palaemonetes australis, a lovely shrimp which as it turns out is very widespread and occurred in every likely looking river I sampled. It's a bigger shrimp than most that we keep, probably 5-6cm total length from memory. It's fairly variable but unfortunately has tiny eggs - at least at the locations I checked - so it's difficult to raise the young in aquaria. I would love to give these a more serious try one day, so I wonder are any WA shrimpers keeping these? Or will they after reading this? Palaemonetes australis: I wasn't sure if this should go in "field trips" or here, and decided to make a different post in each section. In the field trip section there will be more shots and some other stuff too. Make sure you have a look!

I was lucky enough to cruise around SW WA a few years ago looking at some of the things that interest me. Of course, aquatic life was one of those things and I got to see some fish that I'd been interested in for ages. The Salamanderfish (Lepidogalaxias salamandroides) was probably the most significant, and one of the dwarf Galaxias (Galaxiella nigrostriata) was another exciting one for me. I do love to find the eastern species of Galaxiella (pusilla) when I'm out and about back home in Victoria. I travelled from roughly Albany across to Dwellingup, not too far from the coast just south of Perth. Along the way I looked in every waterway where it was convenient to stop and found the south-western glass shrimp Palaemonetes australis virtually everywhere. They varied in colour to a certain extent but were always pale speckled and with transverse pale bars. They grow quite large compared to the shrimp we usually keep, about 5-6cm total length, and are really pretty attractive little guys. I heard stories of nice colour forms occurring closer to Perth, and I can only hope some of you Westies get out and collect from a few spots in the hope of finding some. Then you can send some to me too! We headed to Dwellingup for a mates wedding and spent a few days hanging around there, so I was able to check the river there most extensively. The Murray River, as it happens. This river was made up of large open pools interspersed with short rapid sections. We had the canoe in and were able to negotiate upstream through many of these rapids, occasionally having to drag the canoe over rocks to continue. The downstream return trip was invariably much more fun. Murray River at Dwellingup, WA: Palaemonetes australis from Dwellingup: I found some other nice western fish here, including Tandanus bostocki, Bostockia porosa, Edelia vittata and Galaxias occidentalis. Sorry no photos of these fish. For those who don"t know, Tandanus bostocki is a small version of our eastern Tandanus tandanus, and Bostockia porosa (Nightfish) is a dwarf Percichthyid, essentially a mini Murray Cod. The Edelia and Galaxias are the Western species of Pygmy Perch and Galaxias. However back towards Albany at the start of the trip we stayed at a farm Below the Porongorup range. They had a spring fed waterway which had been protected from the usual farm activities and was quite intact. There I found a lovely little Goby, probably Pseudogobius olorum or a related species. Unfortunately my pic of the waterway was too large to load here so perhaps I'll think to resize it later and try again. I do have pics of the origin of the spring water supply and of the Goby. Porongorup Ranges - where the water came from: Pseudogobius olorum? People near Adelaide can also find Pseudogobius olorum (or a similar species) close to home. It's widespread and may have been split up. Obviously, it's time for everyone to get out and about on a field trip to see what's just around the corner from home. We truly do live in the lucky country here in Australia.