Alien

Here's a strange looking beastie.  I first noticed one of these about a week ago when I was sweeping up autumn leaves and bringing in firewood from the woodstore.  It looks like a little shrimp out of water, it sculls about on its side and then uses those powerful rear legs to jump like a flea.  A quick internet search identified it as a Lawn Shrimp, otherwise known as a Landhopper (Arcitalitrus dorrieni), it feeds on dead leaf matter and needs a moist environment to avoid drying out.  There's nothing to give it scale in this photo, it's just a bit less than a centimetre in length.  It's the only species amongst its Amphipod relatives that is found well away from water, the only other species with which I was familiar were sandhoppers that are found around the coastal high tide line where they feed on washed up seaweeds and other detritus.

The bad news is that this is not native in Britain, it's an invasive species from eastern Australia.  It's spreading quickly throughout the British Isles, it's unlikely to be the first record for Cumbria (the distribution maps are out of date), though I shall submit it to the national recorder and find out.  What is not known is the impact this could be having on native species of woodlice and other species that feed on leaf litter.

Anyway, that's a change from the usual fare in this (now rather occasional) journal.  I promise I shall catch up soon, and give some more news.  I have a back blip of Gus to upload, and will then give an update on how he is doing.  I did drop a mention of him into my reappearance blip on the 10th, so that his followers would know he is still with us.  Thanks for bearing with me, life has been busy, and will continue to be for a while.