Tamworth man Russell Armytage was fishing with his son, Jonathon, when he saw glowing forms in the water.

He reached in and pulled out tiny glowing shrimp.

Mr Armytage has since returned to the spot, the location of which he’s keeping under wraps for now, and caught more, which he’s keeping alive in a home tank.

“In the tank, they look like underwater fireflies,” he said.

“It’s similar to the green glowsticks that you can get, but a bit faded.”

He said they started glowing after 9pm and it had all the experts “baffled”.

Mr Armytage said a common reason why water creatures might glow was because bacteria mixed with their metabolism and created luciforms.

“I think they might be Paratya australiensis, or ghost shrimp,” he said.

Mr Armytage is no stranger to water life, having bred fish, but these tiny glowing specimens have him scratching his head.

He’s sending some samples to the Sydney Museum and a shrimp breeder in Queensland, as well as a university in Brisbane.

“They are very interested in getting specimens to examine them further,” he said.