It is tiny, hairy and “German” – and it could be hiding underneath a piece of driftwood near you. Citizen scientists and expert conchologists are teaming up to conduct the first London-wide search for one of Britain’s most endangered molluscs.

The fingernail-sized German hairy snail ( Pseudotrichia rubiginosa ) is found in fragmented patches of habitat mostly along the tidal Thames.

It was not recorded in Britain until 1982 but fossilised remains indicate it has been here since at least Neolithic times and possibly since the last ice age, when the Thames was still connected to the Rhine, Germany’s longest river.

Now more than 100 volunteers have joined a coordinated search for the snail, led by Citizen Zoo and the Zoological Society of London (ZSL).

The snail is typically found

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