Florist James Gunn had the shock of his life when he opened a box of exotic flowers and a tropical tree frog jumped out.

The small frog had survived a journey of at least 8,000 miles among the flowers and foliage on its journey from the rain forests of Ecuador to Holland and via Germany to its final destination at Gunn's florists in Sydney Street, Brighton.

The flowers were part of a regular delivery from South America and the frog was the last thing James expected to see as he opened the box.

He said: "It jumped straight past my nose and stuck on the wall. It gave me quite a fright. You don't expect a frog to jump out of a sealed box.

"I immediately put a flower pot over it and then a piece of card with holes over the top so it could breathe.

"I have heard of spiders getting packed in boxes, but this is the first time we have had anything like this.

"I have not touched it because I know some of the frogs from South America are poisonous. They use them to make poison arrows."

The inch-and-a-half long tree frog is grey with large eyes, which James says remind him of something in a dinosaur film.

The frog is already in the care of the Booth Natural History Museum in Dyke Road.

Jeremy Adams, assistant keeper of natural sciences, said: "It will need looking after by a specialist, which we can arrange.

"It is a tree frog, but it is not of the poisonous variety. They have come over in bunches of bananas before now. There was a spate of this happening two years ago, but this is the first time I have heard of one coming over in a box of flowers."