Fish of Oceania

Isolation is the defining fact of the region. Cut off from other continents for millions of years, Australia and New Zealand developed a restricted but highly distinctive freshwater fauna, with a high proportion of endemic species and an unusual number of fish that move between sea and river.

The Great Barrier Reef and the reefs of the Pacific offer the opposite: enormous marine diversity, connected to the rest of the Indo-Pacific by currents. One species may occur across thousands of kilometres of islands, in sharp contrast with the compartmented fresh waters next door.

It is also the region where the seasons run opposite to the northern hemisphere. The favourable periods given on each page follow the local calendar, and a southern summer falls between December and February.