A two-person snorkelling team was used to monitor recruitment of the endangered Macquarie perch (Macqauria australasica) from October 2006 to January 2007 in the Cotter River, Australian Capital Territory. Four pools were surveyed weekly (in a 600 m reach) to detect the onset of hatching. Once hatching had commenced, a set of 25 pools spanning 8 km were monitored fortnightly. Recruitment was detected in 23 of 25 of the pools snorkelled, including 13 of 14 pools upstream of a rock-ramp fishway that was constructed in 2001. Recruitment of M. australasica had not previously been recorded above the fishway. The relative efficacy of this technique was compared with that of a conventional passive juvenile sampling technique in the four indicator pools. In the process, strategy for rapidly surveying Macquaria australasica nursery grounds is presented and the expansion in range of an endangered species population is confirmed.