The clear river is full of fishes and tourist boats looking out for the “dangerous” saltwater crocs (left) It is not allowed to enter or swim in the East Alligator River, but Heiko went to catch my fishes, while a swamp eel Ophisternon gutturale cleaned his feet while everyone near by shouted “a snake is attacking you…” (right)
Melanotaenia splendida splendida, a nice colour form, also from the East Alligator and…
…large longtoms Strongylura krefftii a remarkable belonid that makes large sand nests
The seven-spot archerfish Toxotes chatareus has only six-spots here and is living sympatric in the East Alligator with T. jaculatrix (right) The sensational banded archerfish Toxotes jaculatrix has here a bright golden colour unknown from anywhere else, a fantastic fish (left)
A highlight of our research was also the incredible strawman or blackmast Craterocephalus stramineus, it lives in the Northern territory only in the Giyamunckur Black Jungle Spring which merges into the Katherine River
Bruce (left) is a unique character and loves fishes as much as Heiko and both went along very well – although he is frightened about crocs… Zehev (right) posing along side a giant termite housing
On our way back to Darwin we came across a taipan, it is a large, fast, highly venomous Australasian snake and the inland taipan, Oxyuranus microlepidotus, has the most toxic venom of any land species worldwide. Heiko went all the way to photograph it
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