With over ten years of dive experience I have had the opportunity to dive many rarely visited areas. With an eye for small creatures I have come across many rare, unusual and undescribed species. Using Macro (close up) lenses and additional magnification created by Diopters I have been able to take shots of even very small organisms. Whilst interesting and artistic imagery is important it is also important to capture diagnostic features of these unknown species to aid in identification at a later stage. The internet and reference books can be useful tools and will often help to identify an unusual organism to genus level although maybe not to species.

A genus is a taxonomic classification and identifies an organism beyond the level of family and may include a collective of one or more species. The existing convention of naming a species is called Binomial Nomenclature where two italicized Latin names give each individual species a scientific name. These help scientists the world over by creating a standardised way of naming a species. The first of the two Latin names refers to the genus and always begins with a capital. For example all true seahorses belong to the genus Hippocampus so any newly discovered seahorse species will be placed in this genus along with all others. Whilst awaiting a scientific description by a specialist an unknown species is frequently refered to as sp. e.g Hippocampus sp. If the species is indeed new to science it will undergo various tests and very precise measurements. Later a scientific paper will be published containing all morphometric data and any known behavioural or habitat information to allow other scientists to identify this species if encountered again. It will also be given a species name, which is chosen by either the person who first discovered the species or the scientist who describes it. This will take the form of a second italicised name following the genus e.g Hippocampus bargabanti.

Several notable marine discoveries of the 20th century include the Coelacanth (a unique deep water fish with lobed fins, the likes of which, may have been the precursors of the first amphibian limbs) discovered in 1938 and believed extinct for over 60 million years, a Megamouth Shark measuring 14.5ft was caught off Hawaii by a scientific vessel in 1976 and completely unknown to science prior to this, the Hawaiian Monk seal described in 1904 and Hippocampus bargabanti the first of several new species of pygmy seahorse was found on a sea fan off New Caledonia in 1968. Amazingly even an entirely new and unique ecosystem was found to exist on the deep seafloor where nutrient rich waters spewed from the ocean floor at temperatures of over 400°C, first discovered in 1977 near the Galapagos islands in the Pacific off South America and now known to exist with a distinct species composition across the world’s oceans harbouring hundreds of unique species. Even today several species of Beaked whale have never been seen alive and are known only from skulls, the adult animals are estimated to measure over 25 feet. With such huge and significant species remaining so elusive to science it is no wonder divers continue to find such amazing and enigmatic species as mimic octopus, pygmy seahorses and Nudibranchs across the world’s oceans.