Tadpole shrimp creates a splash at Wildwood!
8th Nov 2025
We’re thrilled to share that a captive breeding project started at Wildwood Kent back in March is yielding positive results for the remarkable but endangered UK native tadpole shrimp.
Triops cancriformis – the “living fossil” with a unique habitat
This small crustacean, up to 11cm in length and widespread in Europe, has survived unchanged since before the time of the dinosaurs! With a lineage stretching back at least 220 million years, it’s often called a “living fossil.”
Triops is a fascinating example of adaptation to an inhospitable environment. It lives in temporary freshwater pools that dry up seasonally - a habitat that prevents predators from establishing themselves, but suits Triops as it matures fast, feeding voraciously on invertebrates, plants and sediment, and growing rapidly to reach adulthood in just 2–3 weeks. The eggs it then lays can survive (go into diapause) in the dry for up to 27 years. They can also survive extreme conditions like heat, cold, saltwater immersion, and even digestion by other animals.
Despite this, they are currently found in only two known UK sites, the New Forest and Solway Firth at Caerlaverock, Scotland, and are classified as endangered and legally protected under Schedule 5 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981. Threats to their survival include habitat degradation, loss of grazing (vital for pond health), climate change and drought, pollution, predators (birds and insects), invasive plants, and veterinary chemicals from livestock.
The Wildwood project
Since Spring 2025, Wildwood Trust in Kent has been captive breeding, researching and protecting this species in collaboration with Ian Hughes (Entomologist, Lifeforms Art) and BIAZA, as part of our Native Invertebrate Recovery Centre partnership with Restore. We’re especially indebted to Ian Hughes, who back in 1993 was asked by English Nature, now Natural England, to create an ‘insurance population’ of tadpole shrimps as part of the Species Recovery Programme.
Our aim is to captive-breed high enough numbers to start reintroduction in the next couple of years, both to boost the existing wild populations in the New Forest.
The project is going well
In March we received a population of dried eggs from Ian Hughes originating from the New Forest. These were hatched in water and matured in two weeks. This first population lived about 100 days, laying lots more eggs.
We’re now working in monthly cycles with batches of eggs from the tadpole shrimps we’ve bred, refining the husbandry as we go. The captive breeding process mimics the wild: the tadpole shrimps lay the eggs on soils and dirt, these are left in water for a week, before drying the eggs for a month and finally rehydrated.
The project is going really well and after our trials, we hope to get more zoos involved in captive breeding the UK native tadpole shrimp. It’s a truly amazing creature, and since it’s being bred in the hazel dormouse room by the picnic area, you might just catch a glimpse of it through the window!