Chirocephalus diaphanus

Chirocephalus diaphanus is a widely distributed European species of fairy shrimp that lives as far north as Great Britain, where it is the only surviving species of fairy shrimp and is protected under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981. It is a translucent animal, about 0.5 in (13 mm) long, with reddened tips to the abdomen and appendages. The body comprises a head, a thorax bearing 11 pairs of appendages, and a seven-segmented abdomen. In males, the antennae are enlarged to form 'frontal appendages', while females have an egg pouch at the end of the thorax. The life cycle of C. diaphanus is extremely fast, and the species can only persist in pools without predators. The eggs tolerate drying out, and hatch when re-immersed in water. C. diaphanus was first reported in the scientific literature in 1704, but was only separated from other species and given its scientific name in 1803. The specific epithet diaphanus refers to the animal's transparency. Chirocephalus diaphanus is a 'beautiful, translucent crustacean'. Its body is subcylindrical, and around 0.5 inches (13 mm) long, mostly transparent, but with black eyes, and red tips to the appendages and abdomen. The body becomes wider towards the head, which has a conspicuous mandibular groove. It also bears a pair of stalked compound eyes, as well as a sessile median eye, two pairs of antennae, and the mouthparts. The mouthparts comprise a labrum, directed backwards over the mouth and pairs of mandibles, paragnatha, maxillules and vestigial maxillae. The thorax is made up of twelve body segments, the last of which is fused to the first segment of the abdomen. There is no carapace, but each of the eleven free segments bears a pair of phyllopodia, which have a series of bristles pointing along the animal's midline. The abdomen consists of seven segments without appendages, and a slender telson which bears a pair of caudal rami. Males and females can be recognised by a suite of sexually dimorphic characters. While the antennae of females are triangular and relatively short, males' antennae are long and jointed, and each one bears a complex 'frontal appendage', which is used to clasp the female during mating. The last somite of the thorax is fused with the first somite of the abdomen. In males, it bears a pair of processes, the extensions of the vasa deferentia in a protrusible penis. In females, there is a single egg pouch, which is also thought to derive from a pair of appendages. Chirocephalus diaphanus is a Mediterranean species, which reaches its north-western limit in Great Britain, and is missing from Fennoscandia. Its distribution in Western Europe extends almost continuously from Great Britain to the Iberian Peninsula, and as far east as the Rhine in Germany. A single occurrence of C. diaphanus is known from the Benelux countries, in pools in South Limburg, Netherlands. Further east, it occurs south of 47°N in the Apennine and Balkan peninsulas, reaching the Black Sea in Romania; an isolated population exists at the mouth of the Vistula river in Poland. In the Mediterranean Sea, populations exist on Sicily, Sardinia and Crete. C. diaphanus is the only species of fairy shrimp to occur naturally in Great Britain; Tanymastix stagnalis is found in western Ireland, and Artemia salina formerly occurred in England. Within Great Britain, C. diaphanus is restricted to areas with a deficit of precipitation against evapotranspiration between April and September. This means that it is only found frequently in southern England, with scattered records as far north as Yorkshire.