UPY 2025

UPY 2016 Behaviour - Winner
'Turtle eating Jellyfish'
Richard Carey

After an early morning dive in the Similan Islands, we stopped in a bay to have breakfast. A Green Turtle (Chelonia mydas) surfaced near our boat. I decided to get in and snorkel with it, watching it as it searched for food. Soon it spotted a large Mosaic Jellyfish (Thysanostoma thysanura) swimming a couple of meters below the surface. It swam over to the jellyfish, dived down and started feeding on it. The turtle obviously wanted to keep the jelly close to the surface so every time it swam deeper the turtle would bite onto it and drag it back upwards. I spent a few minutes watching it and taking photos, and then left the turtle to finish his meal in peace.

Judge's comment: Peter Rowlands: Such a good example of what you can make of a chance encounter. It would have been so easy to have finished breakfast and missed this shot! It captures so much and with the background story it is the pinnacle of a visual experience which must have been fascinating to watch and even more satisfying to capture with a moment in time. Simply beautiful too.