Image of Horseshoe Crab Similar to Alien Floating Across Sea Floor Wins Gold in Wildlife Photography Contest

A "luminescent" shot of the horseshoe crab gliding at the bottom of the sea accompanied by three fish earned Frenchman Laurent Ballesta his second title of Wildlife Photographer of the Year. Many found the alien-like creature in the picture beautiful.

Wildlife Photographer of the Year Winning Shot

The golden marine arthropod can be seen in the water, clutching the mud at the bottom. Three tiny golden trevally fish keep track of it, hoping the crab's movements reveal an easy meal in the sediment.

The image was taken by Laurent Ballesta, a marine biologist and underwater photographer, in the protected waters off Pangatalan Island in the Philippines - a haven for crabs. The marine biologist and photographer was awarded during a gala banquet at the Natural History Museum in London.

Kathy Moran, the panel's chair, didn't hide how impressed she was with Ballesta's work. According to Moran, a winning image requires all four characteristics - aesthetics, moment, narrative, and increasingly, "something that has a conservation edge to it." She added that Ballesta's work contained this "secret sauce."

"There's a luminosity to Laurent's picture," Moran said. "It really does feel like an alien floating across the seafloor - but when you step back and realize just how important these creatures are to ocean health and human health, we just felt the image brought it all together and we couldn't pass it up."

Despite having lived for more than 100 million years, the tri-spine horseshoe crab is currently threatened by habitat degradation and overfishing for food and blood, which is used in creating vaccines. However, it is protected in a newly established marine reserve near Pangatalan Island.

Ballesta also spoke about his experience in getting his winning shot. According to him, the technical challenge of the image was determining the proper shutter speed and aperture since he wanted to freeze the horseshoe crab's stillness but leave the small fish unfrozen to demonstrate how excited they were. Ballesta said he wanted to highlight the contrast between the powerful, sluggish, and swift, delicate ones.

Ballesta is the second person to have won the award twice in the competition's 59-year history. He first won the title in 2021 after capturing a photograph of a camouflage grouper fish amid a whirl of eggs and sperm at Fakarava, French Polynesia.

What Is A Horseshoe Crab?

Horseshoe crabs are older than dinosaurs, having been around for over 300 million years. This explains their prehistoric look. They resemble ancient crabs, although their closer relatives are scorpions and spiders. It has ten legs and a thick exoskeleton for mobility.

The horseshoe crab has three portions to its body. The first part is the prosoma, or head, is the initial portion. The second part is the abdomen, or opisthosoma, the body's center. It has spines on the sides and a ridge in the middle, resembling a triangle. The third section is the horseshoe crab's tail, the telson. Although it appears menacing and is long and pointed, it is not harmful or poisonous and does not sting.

The term "horseshoe crab" refers to a type of crab whose head is rounded and U-shaped, precisely like the shoe on a horse's foot. Being the largest, it houses most of the body's biological and neurological systems.

The brain, heart, mouth, nervous system, and glands are all in the skull and covered by a large plate. The largest set of eyeballs is also protected on the head. It has nine eyes dispersed around the body and additional light sensors towards the tail. The two most enormous compound eyes are helpful for mate selection, while the other eyes and light receptors are for detecting movement and variations in moonlight. If they are stuck, horseshoe crabs use the telson to flip themselves around.

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