I saw this beautiful specimen of Umbaculum mediterraneum during a dive in a Mediterranean coral reef at a depth of over 70 meters. In many years of diving I had never come across this nudibranch. It is an adult specimen of rather large dimensions, in fact it is well over 20 cm in length. This leads me to think that, together with Aplysia depilans, it is among the largest nudibranchs present in the Mediterranean Sea.

Abalones or Haliotis are gastropod molluscs of the genus Haliotidae. In Italy the name that is used is Ear of Venus, a name that derives from the beauty of the pearlaceus side inside the shell. The external side as seen is completely different and looks like a concretion or a rock, and it is precisely for this reason that they are difficult to identify on the seabed or attached to rocks. Our Ear of Venus was in a hole a few meters deep and obviously we only found the shell, probably the residue of the usual octopus meal. ...

In this video we have met the Ear of Venus  or at least what remains of the shell, probably after the meal of some octopus or some sea bream ...