#landhopper

[onenicebugperday]

@texas-toadhouse​ submitted: After lots of frantic searching, I believe these are lawn shrimp?? Can you confirm? They took over my dwarf white isopod enclosure and my toad's substrate after I collected leaves and sticks in my neighborhood. I live in south Texas.

Yes that’s exactly what they are! And why it’s important to bake anything you collect from outside before introducing it. They looooove pretty much the exact same conditions isopods love so I have no idea how you’ll get rid of them without drying out the substrate which obviously won’t work for your isopods. They eat decaying organic matter so I don’t think they’d be actively harmful, but I imagine they’d compete for resources with isopods.

[drhoz]

#627 - Talitrid Amphipods - Lawn Prawns

One of our local crustaceans. Not something I get many complaints about, because the only way they'll survive in a house is if there's a major moisture problem. Most amphipods can't survive out of water, but the Talitrid sandhoppers on the beach and landhoppers even further inland can be fully terrestrial.

Terrestrial amphipods are quite diverse in Australia, usually living in leaf litter. The ones you're most likely to find in your garden are translucent dark drown when alive, but turn pink-red after they die, like the ones in the photo above. Rarely above a centimeter in length.