Palio nothus nudibranch
Stalked jelly feeding
Tiny opposum shrimp
down there ,” Paul spluttered as he made his way up the slip . “ It ’ s gin-clear and there ’ s good light . You lucky swine !” Those may not have been his exact words .
Kimmeridge Bay is defined by a series of ledges that increase in depth the further you venture - you can see them from the cliffs above . It ’ s a fertile habitat for the little critters you can expect to find in shallow water , and in glorious 12-metre visibility there was little to stop us finding them .
Stars of the show were the beautiful little stalked jellies that underwater photographers cannot resist . Once you ’ ve got your eye in , you can ’ t help seeing them hanging gamely from kelp and seagrass . They are completely unlike the other jellies you see in UK waters , especially in the way they root themselves to seagrass instead of free-floating . Each one seems to reflect light in a different way , a living jewel the size of a 50 pence coin - remember coins ?
Spotting my first critter opened some cognitive floodgate , because after that I couldn ’ t glance at the reef without seeing some miniature beast . There were opossum
shrimp , Neomysis integer , each no bigger than 10mm , but dancing around a piece of kelp like disco kings and queens . Next came an unfamiliar-to-me nudibranch , Palio nothus which my Seasearch friends tell me is common all over the UK .
The procession continued – sea hares , bivalves , dragonets , painted gobies ... an enormous tompot blenny . The seabed was bristling with life and I had plenty of time to seek it out . In the end we surfaced after a glorious 100-minute bimble , ready for coffee and carb-loading at the nearby cafe .
Painted goby at Kimmeridge
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