Check mate: Mysterious Moreton Bay periwinkle identified

On Sunday afternoon, I paid a visit to the Brisbane River at Murarrie for an hour. There, I poked about the rocks and stalked the shoreline to see if I could find some periwinkles to identify, and caught up with a species that has puzzled me ever since I found it at Lamb Island (below) a few weeks ago.

It is small, with a pointed apex and distinctive, bold patterning on its shell, and at both localities was found on hard substrates near mangroves.

It reminded me of Littoraria luteola in general shape and colour scheme, but was the wrong size and patterning and utilised a different microhabitat, with luteola being arboreal on mangrove trunks and branches. Below is a luteola that I found at Jacobs Well last year.

Studying my books at home, I realised the answer had been staring me in the face the whole time as Littoraria articulata, the checkerboard periwinkle. The book to solve this for me was Graham Edgar's 'Tropical Marine Life of Australia' (2019), which has quickly become one of my most treasured resources.

Also found was the empty shell of a gold-mouthed conniwink (Bembicium auratum).

Whereas the checkerboard periwinkle is found throughout the Indo-Pacific, from India down to Moreton Bay and all the way up to Japan, the conniwink is an Australian endemic, calling our southern estuaries home. These two species co-occurring in the Brisbane River is an example of how in the subtropics, we get the best of both worlds as far as tropical and temperate ecosystems are concerned.

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Tadpoles of South-eastern Australia: A Guide With Keys

Book review Reed New Holland Publishing, 2002. It’s noon on a warm autumn day and I am driving south along Beaudesert Road towards the peripheral suburbs of Brisbane’s southside that remain largely a mystery to me. I have decided that not knowing the amphibian fauna inhabiting the suburb of Algester is a personal error that I simply must rectify. My favourite way to search for frogs is to go spotlighting on humid spring and summer nights, but I have left it a little late this year and doubt my chances at finding them now that the evenings have mercifully turned cooler. Instead, I am going to survey the local amphibian population in a way that is quite new to me, aided by a secret weapon sitting in the passenger seat next to me: Marion Anstis’s book, Tadpoles of South-eastern Australia: A Guide With Keys .

Creek Fishing in the Redlands

Hilliards Creek Situated to the south-east of Brisbane, the Redlands shire encompasses many areas of natural beauty, including the Cleveland foreshore and North Stradbroke Island. It is also one of the fastest growing suburban areas in Australia, and would be unrecognisable to those who knew it as a rural outpost just 25 years ago. Despite this surge in development, even the busy suburbs of Wellington Point, Ormiston and Cleveland retain areas of natural bushland set aside to preserve populations of Koalas (Phascolarctos cinereus) and Squirrel Gliders (Petaurus norfolcensis), from which other forms of wildlife benefit also. On my visit there today, I was interested in looking at how these other creatures are faring, particularly the fish living in Hilliards Creek.

Wild Plants of Moreton Bay

This month marks the one year anniversary of when I headed out into the bush for the first time to study not animals, but plants . It was a decision that changed my life, and I've since come to enjoy going on tree ID quests as much as I enjoy a bout of birdwatching, snorkeling or spotlighting. Last Saturday, I decided to celebrate this momentous occasion with a dawn stroll around King Island Conservation Park, off the coast of Wellington Point.

Wild BNE

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