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Anti-aristarchus [soylentnews.org] writes:

For the photos, take a look at The New York Times article on [nytimes.com]

Divers practicing blackwater photography are helping marine scientists gain new insights into fish larvae.

Very interesting.

For most scuba divers, few places underwater match the visual thrill of a kaleidoscopic coral reef teeming with colorful fish. For Jeff Milisen, a marine biologist and photographer in Kona, Hawaii, there is no better place to dive than an open stretch of deep ocean. At night.

“There’s a whole lot of nothing,” he said. “There’s no bottom, no walls, just this space that goes to infinity. And one thing you realize is there are a lot of sea monsters there, but they’re tiny.”

Of course, there are big monsters, too, like sharks. But the creatures Mr. Milisen is referring to are part of a daily movement of larval fish and invertebrates, which rise from the depths to the surface each evening as part of one of the largest migrations of organisms on the planet. The emerging hobby of taking pictures of them is known as blackwater photography.

Started as a hobby, but now the professionals are getting interested.

In a paper published on Tuesday in the journal Ichthyology & Herpetology [doi.org], scientists from Hawaii, along with Dr. Johnson and others at the Smithsonian, have outlined how they hope to enlist more nighttime underwater photographers, most of whom have no scientific background, to participate in marine research. If the photographers could collect specimens of the tiny animals they photograph, DNA could be extracted and analyzed.

My personal favorite is A bony-eared assfish (Acanthonus armatus).Credit...Steven Kovacs [nyt.com]. Sounds like one of our Soylentils! And the larval cusk-eel, genus Brotulotaenia. [nyt.com] is no slouch, either.

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