Macquaria sp. nov. 'Kangaroo River'
Kangaroo River perch, Kangaroo River Macquarie perch, Shoalhaven River Macquarie perch
Taxonomy & Nomenclature
Conservation Status
Missing (Faulks et al., 2010:922; Garnett et al., 2022) or Extinct (Pavlova et al., 2017a; Department of Environment and Energy, 2018; Low & Booth, 2023)
Last record: 1998 (wild) (Faulks et al., 2010:922; Huntsdale, 2019; Dahlstrom, 2025); 2008 (captivity) (Faulks et al., 2010:922; Low & Booth, 2023)
Distribution & Habitat
Kangaroo River & Shoalhaven River, Shoalhaven area, New South Wales, Australia
Biology & Ecology
Hypodigm
Media
At least five photographs (3 in the wild; 2 in captivity), and one film, exist of this taxon. All can be seen between the Pozible crowd-funding campaign and the YouTube video below:
Short documentary on the related Macquarie perch (Macquaria australasica)
References
Bishop, K. A. (1979). Aquatic communities of an impounded coastal river. Unpublished Masters Thesis, Macquarie University, NSW, Australia.
Dahlstrom, Michael. (2025, May 27). Hunt for rare Aussie fish not seen since 1990s funded by $1 million boost. Yahoo! News (news). Available at: https://au.news.yahoo.com/hunt-for-rare-aussie-fish-not-seen-since-1990s-funded-by-1-million-boost-060002394.html [Accessed 30 May 2025]
Department of Environment and Energy. (2018). National Recovery Plan for Macquarie Perch (Macquaria australasica). Canberra: Commonwealth of Australia. 85 pp.
Dufty, S. (1986). Genetic and morphological divergence between populations of Macquarie perch (Macquaria australasica) east and west of the Great Dividing Range. Honours Thesis, University of New South Wales.
Faulks, L. K., Gilligan, D. M. and Beheregaray, L. B. (2010). Evolution and maintenance of divergent lineages in an endangered freshwater fish, Macquaria australasica. Conservation Genetics 11(3): 921-934. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10592-009-9936-7
Garnett, Stephen T., Hayward-Brown, Brittany K. et al. (2022). Australia's most imperilled vertebrates. Biological Conservation 270: 109561. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2022.109561
Harris, J. H. and Rowland, S. J. (1996). Australian freshwater cods and basses, pp. 150-163. In: McDowall, R. (ed.). Freshwater fishes of South-Eastern Australia. Chatswood: Reed Books. [relevant reference?]
Huntsdale, Justin (2019, December 7). Murky hunt for what could be Australia's first extinct native freshwater fish. ABC News (online). Availale at: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-12-07/search-for-potentially-extinct-kangaroo-river-perch/11769692 [Accessed 21 August 2022]
Kaminskas, S. (2021). Alien pathogens and parasites impacting native freshwater fish of southern Australia: A scientific and historical review. Australian Zoologist 41(4): 696-730.
Lintermans, M. (2007). Fishes of the Murray-Darling Basin: An introductory guide. Murray-Darling Basin Commission Publication No. 10/07.
Lintermans, M., Geyle, H. M., Beatty, S., Brown, C., Ebner, B. C., Freeman, R., Hammer, M. P., Humphreys, W. F., Kennard, M. J. and Kern, P. (2020). Big trouble for little fish: Identifying Australian freshwater fishes in imminent risk of extinction. Pacific Conservation Biology 26(4): 365-377.
Low, Tim and Booth, Carol. (2023). GONE: Australian animals extinct since the 1960s. Invasive Species Council Inc.
OzFish Unlimited. (n.d.). Join us in the Search for the Perch. Pozible (crowd funder). Available at: https://www.pozible.com/project/the-search-for-the-perch/ [Accessed 31 May 2025]
Pavlova, A., Beheregaray, L. B., Coleman, R., Gilligan, D., Harrisson, K. A., Ingram, B. A., Kearns, J., Lamb, A. M., Lintermans, M., Lyon, J., Nguyen, T. T. T., Sasaki, M., Tonkin, Z., Yen, J. D. L. and Sunnucks, P. (2017a). Severe consequences of habitat fragmentation on genetic diversity of an endangered Australian freshwater fish: a call for assisted gene flow. Evolutionary Applications 10: 531-550. https://doi.org/10.1111/eva.12484
Pavlova, A., Gan, H. M., Lee, Y. P., Austin, C.M., Gilligan, D. M., Lintermans, M. and Sunnucks, P. (2017b). Purifying selection and genetic drift shaped Pleistocene evolution of the mitochondrial genome in an endangered Australian freshwater fish. Heredity 118: 466-476.
https://www.fishingworld.com.au/news/the-search-for-the-perch