Biodiversity & Conservation

A gammarid shrimp - Gammarus salinus - General information

A gammarid shrimp

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Distribution map

Gammarus salinus recorded (dark blue bullet) and expected (light blue bullet) distribution in Britain and Ireland (see below)

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Gammarus salinus is not listed under any importance categories.

General information

Key Icon Researched by: Georgina Budd Text page icon Refereed by: This information is not refereed.

Taxonomy icon Taxonomy

Phylum Arthropoda Arthropods, joint-legged animals, e.g. insects, crustaceans & spiders
Class Malacostraca Crabs, lobsters, sand hoppers and sea slaters
Map icon Recorded distribution in Britain and Ireland On all coasts of England, Scotland and Wales in brackish-water, especially in the Humber and Severn Estuaries.
Habitat information icon Habitat information Gammarus salinus inhabits brackish waters of an intermediate salinity. The densest populations have been found in the middle reaches of estuaries that do not have a steep salinity gradient. Gammarus salinus lives amongst algae and other vegetation, as well as generally over the sediment surface and beneath stones.
Text page icon Description Gammarus salinus has a laterally compressed, smooth, curved body, which grows up to 22 mm in length. Its body is divided into three segments; head, pereon (thorax) and pleon (abdomen), but its abdomen is not distinctly demarcated from the thorax in either size or shape. Its head lacks a carapace and is fused with the first thoracic segment. Two well developed elongate pairs of antennae are distinct. Both pairs are pedunculate (a stalk consisting of larger segments) with a long, multi-articulate flagellum. The first pair of antennae have a small accessory flagellum, whilst the second pair have many, longer bristles. Its sessile compound eyes are large, elongate and kidney shaped. Each body segment has its own pair of limbs; pereopods on the thorax and pleopods (used for swimming) and uropods (used for hopping/scudding about on substrata) on the abdomen. The first pair of thoracic limbs are modified into maxillipeds, used for feeding, whilst the second and third pair have a distinctly different, more robust structure and are called gnathopods. The tail-piece (telson) is lobed with bristles and spines. Gammarus salinus appears brownish or greenish brown in colour, with slight transverse banding along the body.

This review can be cited as follows:

Georgina Budd 2002. Gammarus salinus. A gammarid shrimp. Marine Life Information Network: Biology and Sensitivity Key Information Sub-programme [on-line]. Plymouth: Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom. [cited 19/05/2013]. Available from: <http://www.marlin.ac.uk/speciesfullreview.php?speciesID=3373>