Murray basin

There also exists a sister-group relationship between the Melanotaeniidae and Malagasy family Bedotiidae, which may seem surprising given their respective modern-day distributional patterns. The precise origin and subsequent dispersal of the two families has been the subject of debate, with some palentologists suggesting that Madagascar's freshwater fishes derived froma trans-oceanic dispersal during the Cenozoic Era, but the most compelling arguments currently indicate a freshwater radiation which occurred during the Mezozoic break-up of Gondwana.

Described from 'Rivulet in sago forest at Ngaiguli, Terangan, Aru Island, Aru Islands, Maluku, Indonesia', corresponding to the island now normally referred to as 'Trangan' in the Aru Islands group, eastern Indonesia. The islands are located in the Arafura Sea, with western New Guinea to the north and the Arnhem Land Region of Australia's Northern Territory to the south, and though they lie within Maluku province of eastern Indonesia, are part of the Australian continent in a geological sense.

Euryhaline and mostly inhabits coastal floodplains where it's found in both fresh and brackish habitats, including tidal estuaries and salt marshes. It's particularly common in swamps, billabongs, and slow-moving streams where aquatic vegetation grows densely, but some populations have colonised upper sections of freshwater streams. Larger individuals may also move into main river channels. Tappin (2010) gives the following ranges of parameters based on those taken from various localities: temperature 27 - 38 °C, pH 5...