Southeast on Sotra in Øygarden in Western Norway
I was out with my underwater scooter diving for scallops at Liaskjæret one evening at the end of February 2024 when I suddenly saw a nudibranch light up in front of me in the light cone of my diving light. I saw at once that I had never seen this beautiful creature alive before.
Without a camera rig but with a small GoPro
Of course I didn't have my camera with me, just a simple little Gopro and diving light. I filmed and took some pictures. The quality was poor, but good enough for identification. It was the rather illusive Antiopella cristata I had stumbled upon. Already the following morning I was back with both the camera rig and magnifying glass. And I found the beautiful nude at 17 meters deep in about the same place as the night before. I spent maybe half an hour in the same place and found two more Antiopellas. They did fine and the pictures weren't bad at all. Later in the day I shared a couple of photos on Facebook.
Dive buddy Hege completely fired up!
She had been scouting for these for a long time, so Hege would like me to take her to the place where I found them. So we were there already the next day. Since it was the end of February it was a bit cold, so we quickly put on our gear and jumped in and sank to the bottom. Since it was quite a long way to swim to the place where I had seen the Antiopellas, Hege got to hang on to me on a 10-minute underwater scooter ride to the shallows where I had found them last time. And after a bit of searching, Hege also found them while I collected some scallops. Yes, I took some photos too, but mostly looked after Hege since I was her transport back to the marina.
A really beautiful nudibranch
Antiopella cristata is perhaps the most beautiful nudibranch in our waters. It is observed rather rarely, but has been found from the Mediterranean and up the entire coast to the west coast of Sweden and further around Norway to just north of the Trondheimsfjord. It lives in the kelp forest and down to approx. 40 meters deep where it eats branch-forming bryophytes. The times I have hit it, it is also often in places that are slightly exposed to electricity. It eats branch-forming bryophytes, of which you can see an example in this picture.
On the club nest at Sotra I also found several A. cristata, the last time at the beginning of April 2024. In the strait between Sotra and the mainland there is quite a lot of current, so this place is not for everyone.
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