ChronologyDarwin is the largest port on the tropical northern Australian coast. On 27th March 1999, during the wet season phase of the Port of Darwin Survey for adventive marine species, divers discovered dense (23,650 individuals m~?) aggregations of a thin shelled "mussel" on floating pontoons, concrete piles, retaining walls, ship's hulls and mooring ropes (Fig. 1) inside Cullen Bay (Bivalvia: Dreissenidae) in Australia." Molluscan Research 20(2), 25-30.

Glypheids first appeared in the Lower Triassic period and were believed to be extinct until specimens of Neoglyphea inopinata Forest & Saint Laurent and Laurentaeglyphea neocaledonica Richer de Forges were described in 1975 and 2006, respectively. The finding of extant species has meant that molecular data can now be used to complement morphological and fossil-based studies to investigate the relationships of Glypheidea within the Decapoda. However, despite several molecular studies, the placement of this infraorder within the decapod phylogenetic tree is not resolved. One limitation is that molecular resources available for glypheids have been limited to a few nuclear and mitochondrial gene fragments. Many of the more recent large-scale studies of decapod phylogeny have used information from complete mitogenomes, but have excluded the infraorder Glypheidea due to the unavailability of complete mitogenome sequences. Using next-generation sequencing, we successfully sequenced and assembled complete mitogenome sequences from museum specimens of N. inopinata and L. neocaledonica, the only two extant species of glypheids. With these sequences, we constructed the first decapod phylogenetic tree based on whole mitogenome sequences that includes Glypheidea as one of 10 decapod infraorders positioned within the suborder Pleocyemata. From this, the Glypheidea appears to be a relatively derived lineage related to the Polychelida and Astacidea. Also in our study, we conducted a survey on currently available decapod mitogenome resources available on National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) and identified infraorders that would benefit from more strategic and expanded taxonomic sampling.

The Night Parrot Pezoporus occidentalis is a much sought-after, recently 'rediscovered', endangered nocturnal parrot, endemic to arid Central Australia. Very little is known of its ecology, and its eggs have never been formally described. The literature on the eggs of the Night Parrot is collated here, and the provenance of an alleged Night Parrot egg found in the Tanami Desert, Northern Territory, in 1983 was assessed using DNA analysis and physical characteristics. Anecdotal reports from the late 19th-early 20th Century indicate that the Night Parrot lays a clutch of two to six roundish, white eggs. We suggest that its eggs are probably similar to and slightly larger than those of its congener, the Ground Parrot P. wallicus. The alleged Night Parrot egg was definitively identified by mitochondrial DNA analysis to be from the Brown Quail Synoicus ypsilophorus. This represents the first evidence of breeding by this species in the Tanami Desert, and lays to rest a long-standing misconception regarding the parrot.