UPY 2024

UPY  Behaviour - Highly Commended
'Mating Nudibranchs'
Steven Kovacs

Traveling 5 miles off the coast of Florida at night and jumping into the ocean to drift near the surface in 600 foot depth, one can come across many wonderful and strange pelagic animals. One of these amazing animals is this pelagic Nudibranch (sea slug) that swims and lives up in the water column.
Just coming across these wonderful creatures is rewarding enough but on one particular dive I was fortunate to come across two of them together. It took a moment to realize that they were connected to each other and were, in fact, in the process of mating. What made this super rare encounter even more special is that in the split moment the photograph was taken, it appeared as if the nudibranchs were introducing themselves face to face with a handshake. A truly unique encounter in an other worldly setting.

Judge's comment: Fabulous to see this incredibly rare record of these pelagic molluscs mating, so alien to us, it could be a photo not from the Gulf Stream, but from another planet. Must have been very difficult to photograph with ephemeral behaviour, in the dark and with semitranslucent tiny animals.
- Alex Mustard