The Sunday Telegraph - Sunday

EYE-POPPING POLYPS

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Coral reefs of Raja Ampat vs Pink sea fans of Plymouth

GO GLOBAL

Raja Ampat, in eastern Indonesia, is the world’s most biodiverse area, and renowned for its forests of gorgonian fan corals.

STAY AT HOME

You can find colonies of pink fan corals on many of the shipwrecks around Plymouth, but my favourite place is the Eddystone Lighthouse, where they can be found hanging like nets between rocky gullies. UK fans are a bijoux 12in tall by 16in wide, but look at them up close and you will appreciate the intricacie­s of their structure, the distinct pinkishgol­d hue of the feeding polyps. Pink sea fans are often used by spotted catsharks (yes, Britain has leopard-spotted sharks, too) to secure their developing eggs to the structure. Look really closely and you may even see a superbly camouflage­d sea slug, Tritonia nilsodhner­i, which mimics the textures of the coral, just as a pygmy seahorse does out in Raja Ampat.

DIVE DEEPER

Dive centre at Fort Bovisand, Plymouth, through Discovery Divers (discoveryd­ivers.net).

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An inquisitiv­e grey seal pup off the Farne Islands, far left; a jewel anemone, left
BEST OF BRITISH An inquisitiv­e grey seal pup off the Farne Islands, far left; a jewel anemone, left

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