Ephemeral saline lakes in Australia generally fill in the south in winter, but in the eastern inland they fill in summer. In both areas water lasts 4-8 months before evaporating to dryness again. The phenology of their invertebrates has been studied in two sets of southern lakes, but details are lacking for any remote inland set. For the Paroo, I examine the phenology of a summer fill in 1995 and compare it to invertebrate colonization in a rare winter fill in 2016. In the southern sites crustaceans dominated in winter and insects were absent or rare. In the inland, crustaceans dominated in both winter and summer fills, but insects were common only in the Paroo summer fill in 1995 and also towards the late spring of its 2016 winter fill. Also succession is more pronounced in the inland as salinity changes are more directional and severe. The meaning of these scenarios will be explored.